Broken and Whole
by wjjmwmsn5
Summary: Castiel Novak does not believe in heaven. Castiel Novak does not believe in God. Castiel Novak does not believe in angels. He has no reason to think that there's anything more than hell and demons and death forever. That is, until a certain green-eyed angel flies into his life. (May progress beyond T)
1. Chapter 1

Castiel had always known that his life was set up as a bad one when he got old enough to truly understand that his parents had named him _Castiel._ Castiel Novak. _Castiel_ freaking _Novak._ To make matters worse, his youngest brother's name was Gabriel. A normal name. And yet, four years earlier, they named him Castiel, and two years after they named him Castiel, they named his other younger brother Balthazar.

They both had issues with nicknames. Balthazar, Gabriel, and their mother called Castiel Cassie. Especially Balthazar, whom he was closest with and had always confided in. Sometimes Gabriel teased them for their names, but neither of them cared, especially when he was younger. As he got older, it was a bit more annoying, but neither of them got onto him for it. In school, a lot of people teased Balthazar especially, so Castiel would frequently get in trouble with their mother for getting in trouble by punching whoever was rude to him.

Gabriel never had trouble with teasing, as he was always the cool person at each school, especially when he went to school. Castiel and Balthazar were the ones who tried and studied as hard as they could. Gabriel's lack of effort in school often led their mother to have to get onto him, and it wasn't very pretty to see her explode on them, but it seemed that Gabriel never cared, and Castiel never knew why he was unaffected. He always flinched at the first word she said loudly.

Maybe it was because when she got really mad, she got physical with him.

He tried not to think about that, and succeeded the busier he was, and he was always busy. When she left them alone for weeks on end with little money, he had to find ways to provide for his little brothers and keep the shitty motel roofs over their heads. He was pretty good at poker so that was the way he usually got them money, but he also played pool and learned to pickpocket. Whenever he was caught, he would drop whatever he was trying to pickpocket, duck his head so they wouldn't see his face, and run as fast as he could back to their motel.

Balthazar sometimes asked if he could help Castiel, but he never let him. He mostly just didn't want Balthazar to have to deal with the shit he had to, taking care of both of them, but he also knew that if they both got caught with something serious and went to jail or something, Gabriel would be stuck alone with their mother for who knew how long, which maybe wasn't too bad. He'd be able to eat properly all the time, but Castiel was scared she'd drop the _Oh my sweet baby Gabriel_ thing if she was around him all the time and would treat him more like she treated Castiel. And he'd be so close to the hunts she went on, closer than he'd ever been. Castiel knew he would probably be taught how to hunt one day anyway, but he wanted desperately to prolong the inevitable for as long as possible, no matter how much Gabriel asked to be taught. He knew how to fight and defend himself. That was all he needed until he was older.

Castiel told Balthazar about it when he was five, and their mother had been furious with him. Suddenly it was _so_ important to her that her children, who she tossed around from one town to the next while she went off and tried to find the asshole that killed their dad, remained innocent. Well, Castiel couldn't keep it from Balthazar forever, and as much as he hated it, he decided that it was time to tell him when he was five. Castiel was only seven and he already felt more like a parent figure to him than their mother would ever be.

...

That was why he sat down Gabriel when he was six, hoping their mother wouldn't be as angry about it since he'd waited a year more than he had with Gabriel. Balthazar sat next to him, wanting to help. Castiel appreciated it. He was _scared_ that their mother would be angry, and even though he was only eight, Balthazar was the perfect comforting presence.

"Okay, Gabriel," was how Castiel started, pausing after that, searching for the right words. "Okay," he said again, taking a little breath and then beginning. "You know when Dad died, it was because of the house burning, right?"

"Right," Gabriel said, frowning at Castiel. They didn't usually talk about their dad. Castiel had been only four when he died and had to herd two-year-old Balthazar and six-month-old Gabriel from the flames while their mother screamed at the ceiling, begging for him to be alive and nearly leaving them orphans. "Why?"

"Well, because it wasn't just fire," he said, swallowing. "It was a monster. We don't really know what monster, but that's what Mom does when she leaves: she goes and hunts monsters and looks for the one that killed Dad."

Gabriel frowned for a second, staring at them. Castiel could see Balthazar nodded in his peripheral vision. "She hunts… monsters," he repeated slowly. He looked up at Castiel and Balthazar. "Is she… is she like a superhero?"

_Far from it,_ Castiel thought, but he just nodded, smiling halfheartedly. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah, Mom's a superhero."

...

As they grew older, Gabriel began to see that their mother was not, in fact, a superhero, but rather an antihero, and sometimes a misguided hero. She didn't exactly match up to the role as _villain,_ but sometimes she wasn't exactly that far behind. Sometimes she was really great, making it home in time for Christmas with a little tree and gifts for all of them and a gigantic meal and smiles and laughter and patting everyone on the head saying, "Merry Christmas!" and "I love you all!" but never once did she say, "Thank you, Castiel," or "I'm proud of you, Castiel." "You're so smart, Gabriel," she might say. Maybe, "You're getting so tall, Balthazar!"

Castiel was taller than Balthazar. He got better grades than Gabriel. He didn't understand what was wrong with him.

And that was what he thought and would always think: There was something actually wrong with him. He wasn't smart enough, he wasn't helpful enough, he wasn't good enough at taking care of them. He wasn't quick enough on the hunts their mother took him on. He was wrong, over and over and over again. He needed to fix himself but he _couldn't._ He was _wrong _and he was _stupid_ and he was_ bad_, and there was nothing he could do to fix it, and one night, when he came out of the bathroom with a dark bruise on his cheek after a screaming session with their mom, and he curled up on the motel bed that was his, crying and hating himself for it, and he told himself: "You deserve this, Castiel. You're _broken._"

But there was Balthazar, sitting on his bed when their mom left, patting his back and saying to him, "Cassie, you're the best big brother, okay? Please, please, Cassie, don't ever think differently."

He smiled up at him, for his sake, and nodded slightly. "Okay," he whispered. "Thank you, Balthy."

Balthazar smiled, and Castiel hated how much it was already starting to resemble his own small, defeated smile. He was only twelve years old. He didn't need to be dealing with the things Castiel was, because if Balthazar did, then soon so would Gabriel, and then they'd all be worn down, and it was Castiel's job to lift the weight of their pain by himself.

...

When Castiel was sixteen, he got his license. He didn't know why this excited him so much. He knew he wouldn't get his own car. But driving them across the country in the beautiful Impala their mother owned when she was too drunk to drive was the best thing ever. He hated smelling the alcohol on her breath as it wafted through the car, but being on the road, listening to old music that he didn't even really like because Gabriel insisted, it was great. Balthazar begged for him to turn on classical music, for both of them enjoyed that more than Led Zeppelin and AC/DC.

"There's this girl at the gas station near the last motel we stayed at," Gabriel was saying over the music, "and she totally—"

"Gabriel," their mother said, clutching her forehead. "I have a headache. Please don't talk."

"But the music is on. Shouldn't that be hurting your—"

"_Gabriel._"

"Sorry," he said quietly. Castiel saw him look down in the mirror and he looked back at him, meeting his eyes briefly and smiling.

_Tell me and Balthy later,_ he mouthed to him.

_Okay,_ he said, smiling slightly.

...

When Castiel was seventeen, he walked behind the high school where Gabriel waited for them after school. The junior high let out ten minutes before the high school, so Gabriel walked up there while Balthazar and Castiel were getting out. Instead of finding Gabriel slumped against the wall of the school like usual, Balthazar and Castiel found him with his body entwined in a girl's, their lips locked together as they made out sloppily. She was all but pressed up against the brick wall of the school.

"Shit, Gabriel!" Balthazar said, grinning slightly at their little brother. He and the girl jumped away from each other quickly, and the girl apologized, brushing past quickly and not looking back. She looked Balthazar's age. Gabriel was kissing a high school kid and he was only in eighth grade. It didn't bother Castiel. He had first made out with a girl when he was thirteen too.

"How long were you two going at it like that?" Castiel asked as they walked back to the motel they were staying at.

Gabriel flushed slightly and looked around. "You know, just since I got there… She was out back, so we… You know."

Castiel frowned over at him. He knew that his brother was lying but he was trying to decide if it was actually worth calling him out on it or not. After a second, he decided that it wasn't worth lecturing him over or anything, but he did want to know if Gabriel had snuck out of school or not.

"Gabe, you're not going to be in trouble if you skipped class," he told him. "I just don't want you to lie to me."

He hated that their mother instilled that whatever tiny thing they did wrong, they'd be punished severely for. It made them less honest, mostly to her, but sometimes Gabriel was caught in a lie to Castiel or Balthazar. He hated that Gabriel didn't even trust them and wished that he was as close to them as he and Balthazar were to each other.

"I skipped out the last three periods," he admitted, looking down at the ground, at his old sneakers as he walked. Gabriel was shorter than even Castiel had been four years ago, and four years ago Castiel had been kind of short. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay," Castiel said, shrugging and bumping into him. "I'm not mad."

"Don't tell Mom!" he begged. "Neither of you!"

"We won't," Balthazar spoke up, punching his arm lightly and smiling. "It's nothing, really. So, you made out behind the school? So, you skipped class? Please, you're going to have step up your game if you wanna be a real rebel."

"Balthazar, you're a dork," Gabriel said, smiling slightly and looking down at his shoes again.

...

A few weeks later, Castiel found himself pressed against someone in the alley behind the school. It was a new one again. Their mom had been looking for a nest of vampires for a couple days and they hadn't heard from her. Before she left, she had hit him again for letting Gabriel get away with skipping class to make out with the girl behind the school—she found out through some really invasive eavesdropping—and he was still so angry that he couldn't focus on schoolwork, so the first attractive face he saw, he went up to and started flirting to. It was a guy, which was new to Castiel but not exactly unwelcomed. In fact, as soon as he realized that the guy was ten times hotter than most girls in the school, he came to the conclusion that he wasn't totally straight. He had been questioning this for a while, but it became unofficially official as he tugged the guy to the alley. He wasn't really thinking of this much, though. There was a hot guy waiting to be kissed and questioning exactly which gender(s) he liked was at the bottom of his list of things to do.

"Castiel," the guy breathed, and Castiel kissed his neck, biting down slightly. Though he knew his name at the time, he would forget it by the time he moved onto the next school. As it was, his mind was a litany of _Jackson Jackson Jackson is so hot Jackson's voice is so deep Jackson's lips are very soft Jackson Jackson. _

So Castiel breathed back, "Jackson…" and it all went from there with their bodies pressed up against each other and their hands running down their backs and through their hair and their tongues in each other's mouths and it was all a mess because if they moved too far to the left the school cameras would catch them and they kept drifting to the right where the teachers could see if they looked out their classroom windows but they didn't care. Castiel was pulling the same act that Gabriel had that got him in trouble in the first place and he loved it. He also loved how soft the guy's lips were. _Damn, he's a good kisser,_ was at the forefront of his mind when the litany of _Jackson_s faded briefly.

They went back into the school after a period's worth of kissing and breathing each other's names and sucking on each other's necks and collarbones.

He didn't tell his brothers.

...

When Castiel was eighteen, his mom was taking him on a hunt, looking for a run-of-the-mill ghost in a run-of-the-mill town for a hunt. Balthazar was watching Gabriel a couple towns back. Castiel had already graduated by then, so he didn't need to stay behind for school.

As much as he wanted to go to college, he knew it wasn't realistic, so he didn't press it any further than when his mother pointed out that he didn't even know what he'd go for and he was much better off just hunting. So he hunted with her. He trained to look for the monster that killed their dad. He learned to see her in a different light than he had when he was younger. He never idolized his mother, but he always believed that what she did, she did for a good cause, and that was the most important thing.

When he started hunting with her a month earlier, he didn't trust her as much as he did. He didn't believe that in the middle of the hunt she wouldn't start yelling at him for not being with Gabriel. But as time progressed, he started to notice a change in her behavior around him. She was very kind. She started opening up to him, talking to him about his father and about their life and about her choices after his death.

"I just have to protect you," she said as they leaned against the hood of the Impala. She was sipping a beer. "You, Gabriel, and Balthazar are all I've got and family is the most important thing in the world, Castiel." She looked over at him, her eyes oddly fierce—not in an angry way, but like she was _desperate_ for him to understand what she had to say. "Repeat that, Castiel: 'Family is the most important thing in the world.'"

He stared at his mother for a moment, mouth hanging open slightly like he was about to speak but he didn't. She raised an eyebrow and he stuttered out, "Why?"

"Because, Cassie," she said, sighing. "You don't leave family. You don't _ever _leave your little brothers behind."

"I won't—I've _never_—"

"Castiel, you can't say you've _never._"

He couldn't.

"Mom," he started slowly, leaning down and getting a beer. He wasn't going to take one—not because he wasn't twenty-one but because he didn't like how often she drank them, and he didn't want to be like that—but he felt their feelings-spilling session called for some beer.

"No, just say it to me, Cassie," she begged him. "You don't leave family behind."

"You leave us behind all the time," he said quietly.

Her eyes got dark and stormy—the look that came right before she hit him. He flinched, but she hadn't hit him since he was seventeen. He remembered her telling him that he was an adult and that there would be no more of that. That was a punishment for a child. Yet she rarely hit Gabe, and a bit less rarely but still rarely did she hit Balthazar. He didn't question it though. She was doing it for good. That was all that mattered. She was not the best by any means, but she was a decent mother. She was doing it all for good reasons.

"Family is the most important thing," he said slowly. "You don't leave it behind."

"And you do what you have to for them," she added, but she didn't tell him to repeat it. "Look, Cassie, you're old enough that you need your own car. I've been thinking about this for a couple years but I decided to wait until you were old enough, and since you're almost nineteen, I think it's time I give you the Impala."

She bought a black truck the next day and drove to Virginia without telling any of them. When she got there, she called Castiel and told him to look after the boys for a while.

_So much for you don't leave family._

...

"Cassie," Balthazar said one night when Castiel was nineteen. He had just gotten back from a hunt in Rhode Island—a particularly grisly pack of werewolves that were no fun to track down and less fun to kill. He had been gone a week. Both of his brothers were old enough to take care of themselves, but Castiel still stayed with them for weeks on end between hunts. Their mom went from state to state, calling frequently but visiting only sometimes.

Sometimes Castiel would thinking about the day they leaned on the hood of the car and he got the Impala and he was so happy and then she _left._

_She's doing it for the best. She's _saving_ people,_ he told himself.

"Yes, Balthy?" he said, looking up from the book he was reading. It was kind of boring—some stupid love story thing—but it was cheap and he liked to read so he powered through for the sake of doing something while the boys did their homework.

"D'ya think I'm going to get into college?" he asked. His homework was sitting in his lap. Castiel had looked at it and it was some advanced shit that he'd never seen from school. Balthazar was so upsettingly _smart_. Castiel wasn't jealous—he was damn proud—but it was just crazy how he could pore through endless algebra or chemistry notes and never bat an eye, how he could go from school to school and consistently get As and Bs.

With Castiel basically being their mom's replacement, though, he decided to leave them at the same school since they were more than capable of providing for themselves at their age. Fraud wasn't out of the question, though usually they just tried to play poker or pool. Balthazar even had a job at a fast food place.

"Definitely," he said, frowning at him. "Why do you even have to ask?"

Balthazar sighed and ran a hand through his hair, as light as their mothers. He actually looked a lot like their mother: same blonde, wavy hair and blue eyes. It was more like her than either Gabriel or Castiel looked. Where Balthazar had light hair, Castiel's was very dark, but he did have very blue eyes, bluer than Balthazar's and his mother's. Gabriel's hair wasn't as dark as his or as light as Balthazar's, and he liked to wear it longer, at least below his ears. His eyes were brown, but also with gold flecks that Castiel had always noticed and wondered if he would grow out of, but he never did. It gave his eyes the look of sunlight tumbling through a glass of whiskey.

"I don't know," he said, sighing and looking back at his homework. "You didn't go."

Castiel shrugged slightly. "I'm different," he said. He stood up and went to Balthazar's side, sitting next to him. "Listen, you're literally the smartest person I know and don't even fight me on this because you are."

Balthazar looked up at him and rolled his eyes. "You're really smart."

"Balthazar," he said, nudging him with his shoulder. "I said don't fight me on it. Hang on; we'll get an outsider's opinion. Gabriel!"

"I'm taking a shit," Gabriel called from the bathroom. "Can this wait, like, five seconds?"

"No," Castiel said. "Who's the smartest person you've ever met?"

"Your dick," Gabriel called out to them and Castiel rolled his eyes. "Or Balthazar."

Now both of them rolled their eyes. "I don't even know what that's supposed to mean," Balthazar said.

"He doesn't even know, trust me," he said, smiling at his little brother. "So, believe me now?"

"Slightly more," he said, looking up at him. "Thanks, Cassie."

"No problem, Balthy."

...

Castiel was never really sure when things all turned to shit, but he was pretty sure it was when Gabriel dropped out of high school the next year. Balthazar was given a scholarship for Stanford University School of Medicine, which was great, beyond great, but he got in a huge fight with their mom—she was visiting when he found out—and he screamed and he rushed out and Castiel wasn't sure what to think. Their mom got in her truck and left, and he didn't hear from her again for a long, long time.

Gabriel started hunting with him. They traveled around in the Impala, and it was all great, having him to help, but Balthazar and their mother both didn't answer their calls. They were isolated from everything they'd ever known and it was hard, going out and fighting monsters when they didn't even know where their mom or brother really were and they didn't know how to contact them and they just—they _didn't know._ Castiel felt like such a failure he blamed himself. He told himself that there had to have been something that might've caused Balthazar to leave happily and they'd call all the time and talk to each other and he'd ask about hunting and Castiel would ask about school and Gabriel would ask about college parties.

There was nothing good in what he was doing, surely. He was doing something wrong, and his mind went back to a night a long time ago when his mother hit him. He whispered to himself, _You deserve this, Castiel. You're _broken. And that is what he thought again, driving down listening to a combination of Beethoven and AC/DC and Elvis and everything in between. He smiled and sang along with Gabriel, but when it hushed down, he stared out over the road.

_You're wrong. You're bad._

_You deserve this._

_You are _broken_, and you will _never _be whole._

...

It wasn't for another couple of years before everything crashed down around him. He left Gabriel alone on a hunt because he wasn't feeling well and it was just a couple vampires. The rest of their nest had died years ago and they hadn't turned anyone yet but they were killing people. It would be easy to take them out, so he went out and did it alone. He drove back, listening to the rumble of the Impala's engine instead of music. When he got back to the motel, going in his and Gabriel's room, he found it empty. He frowned.

"Gabe?" he called, setting his stuff down and looking around when there was no answer. He pulled out his phone and called him, but the line was disconnected, which it hadn't been when he left a few hours ago. Panicking, Castiel called their mother, the only person he thought might have any information, but as always, she didn't answer.

"Fuck, Mom," he said into the voicemail, "Gabe's _gone. _I went to kill some vamps, and he wasn't feeling good so he stayed at the motel, and I come back and he's gone and his phone's disconnected—I can't find him—Mom—_fuck!_" He sat the phone down on the table, leaning against it as he tried to breathe again, which was becoming increasingly harder with each second because Gabriel was _gone_, his little brother—it was his job to _protect Gabriel_ and he'd failed like he always did and he was feeling dizzy so he sat on the floor and breathed in and out until he was levelheaded again. He felt drained but he stood up and picked up his phone again. "Sorry. Just—give me a call. Please. I'm going to try calling Balthazar."

He hung up, staring at the phone. He wanted to throw it against the wall, but instead he just sat at the table, his head in his hands, hating himself because Gabriel was gone and maybe he'd come back and he'd feel embarrassed for overreacting but it didn't look like it.

He called Balthazar. He left voicemails. He texted. _Nothing._ Eventually he got a call back and he immediately answered.

"Balthazar! I haven't talked to you in _forever!_" he exclaimed.

"Um," said a decidedly female voice on the other end, "my name isn't Balthazar. Look, you've been calling me for two years and it's annoying and weird and I don't know who you are so can you please just stop? I'm sure a pretty nice guy and I'm sorry this Balthazar dude changed his number without telling you but this is my number now so just—" Castiel hung up.

He changed his number. _He changed his number._ He—changed—his—number. For the longest time they'd all been calling that number, hoping for Balthazar, but it was never him.

Part of him was angry because if the girl hadn't used the default voicemail then he wouldn't have thought it was Balthazar for so long. He needed something silly to be angry at so he wasn't consumed with this maddening _ache_, this voice in his head, this screaming cry of _YOU RUIN EVERYTHING._

But though he was angry and upset and felt a little betrayed by Balthazar, the pain of him leaving coming up to him and rubbing him raw like it was all still fresh and he'd just left a month or so ago—despite this, there was something more pressing he needed to think about: Gabriel. And the only thing he thought to do was wait.

He waited throughout the rest of the day for Gabriel. The sun dipped in the sky outside the window and he sat at the table, reading though he could hardly focus. Eventually he pulled out his laptop and looked for any very recent things locally that could have to do with Gabriel's disappearance, but nothing came to him on the Internet. It was three in the morning when he decided he needed to sleep.

The next morning, when Gabriel still wasn't there, he knew he had to go. He packed up all of Gabe's stuff, which was beyond painful. Then he got his stuff too and brought it all out to the Impala, tossing it in the backseat and heading to California, listening to classical music the whole way there. He couldn't bear listening to Gabriel's favorite music, so he stuck to his and Balthazar's. That didn't help much more, but he couldn't listen to the deafening silence the whole way to Stanford.

...

He got there a few days later after much delay and many stops to eat and sleep. He could've gotten there quicker but he stalled a lot. He wasn't sure what he was going to do, how he was going to find Balthazar at Stanford, _if he was even still there._ But he held up hope that it would all pull together when he got there.

He arrived and asked around until a girl with blonde hair and a nice smile said, "Oh, he's in class. Who are you?"

"I'm his brother, Castiel Novak," he said quickly. "I really need to talk to him—Um, who are you?"

"I'm Jess," she said. "His girlfriend. I sort of live with him."

"Great," Castiel said. "Where do you guys live? Wherever it is, just take me there and I'll wait for him."

Jess frowned slightly. "I've got to get to class, but I guess I can let you in," she said.  
"He should be coming home in twenty minutes, I think…"

"Great, yeah, whatever," he said. "Just take me there."

"Hey, how do I even know you're his actual brother?" she asked, raising her eyebrows. "I've heard him talk about his family but I'm not just letting you in without proof."

"Fucking shit," he snapped, fumbling for his phone and scrolling through his pictures until he found one of Balthazar, Gabriel, and himself. "There. See? That's me. That's Balthazar there, and there's our little brother Gabriel. _Please_."

"Fine," she said, starting to lead him there. He followed her quickly. "What's so important anyway?"

"Gabe's missing," he said.

She frowned. "Oh, I'm sorry," she said. "Have you talked to the police?"

"Um, yeah, whatever," he said. "Please hurry." Castiel was annoyed with her for walking way too slow and stopping entirely when a bee almost landed on her. It wasn't actually so urgent that he got to Balthazar, he just… he didn't want to do this alone. He couldn't do this alone. And he wanted so badly to see him after all the time apart. He wanted to apologize for whatever he'd done. He wanted to know why Balthazar had left them.

Jess fumbled with her keys when they got to where she and Balthazar lived. They went into the house and she vaguely motioned around as she turned on the lights. "This is it," she said. She looked up at the clock. "Okay, I've got to go. See you, Castiel."

He nodded goodbye to her, though she was already practically sprinting out the door, shutting it behind her. Castiel looked around when she was gone, feeling like he was intruding. He sat down on their couch awkwardly and fiddled with the hem of his sleeve.

About five minutes later, Balthazar came into the apartment and nearly jumped out of his shoes when he saw Castiel. "Shit—Castiel! What the hell are you doing here?"

He stood up from the couch, not sure what to say. It felt like his tongue was sticking to the roof of his mouth and his lips were zipped shut. After a stressful moment, he got out, "Gabriel's gone."

Balthazar's anger and confusion dissipated to fear and worry. "_What?_ How?"

"We were on a hunting trip. I hadn't been to the motel in a few hours and when I came back he was gone," he said, biting his lip slightly. "Balthazar, you fucking changed your number."

"That's not important right now, Castiel," he said, setting his stuff down and going across the living room to where it opened up into the kitchen. He started making what seemed to be tea. "Look, what do you want me to do about this? Go hunt with Mom."

"I haven't talked to her since you left," he said. "It's just been me and Gabe."

Balthazar sighed heavily and looked back at him. "I'm out of that life, Castiel. I'm in college now."

"I _know_, but I can't do this alone!" he said. "We have to find him. We can look for a trail from here and leave to look on Friday nights so you don't miss school. _Please._"

Balthazar didn't say anything. Castiel felt like he could stab him.

"It's our _brother._ He'd want you to look for him. He'd want you to help me, Balthazar," Castiel said quietly, almost pathetically desperate. "Saving people, hunting things. The family business."

Balthazar looked back at him, letting out a breath. "Have tea with me, Castiel. We'll talk about it."


	2. Chapter 2

**So. Yeah. Hi. I hope you like this? Maybe favorite/alert/review it? Yes that'd be nice.**

**Sorry for excessive manpain but sometimes you've just gotta get the shitload of manpain out of the way so you can work on the Higher Plot.**

**Also I'll usually proofread/edit my chapters, but dammit tonight I just wanna get this posted, so here we are. Unedited. **

* * *

_Balthazar looked back at him, letting out a breath. "Have tea with me, Castiel. We'll talk about it."_

* * *

Castiel walked into the kitchen, looking around slightly but trying not to. It felt like less of an invasion of Balthazar and Jess's privacy if he didn't look around their place, even though Jess had willingly let him in. He sat down at the little two-person table across from Balthazar as he brought tea over to him.

"Since when do you like tea?" Castiel asked, taking it and holding his hand on the warm mug.

"Since Jess," Balthazar answered as he sat down, not looking up from his cup of tea. Neither of them sipped from theirs for a second, nor did they say anything. After a moment, Castiel could see Balthazar looking up and opening his mouth, but he didn't say anything. He looked away again and they both sat like that, unsure of what to say. What were you supposed to say in a situation like that?

Finally Castiel decided to break the silence. It was closing in around him and he couldn't take it. "I missed you," he said quietly, leaning against the wall next to the table and finally taking a drink of his tea. He swallowed, and when Balthazar still hadn't said anything, he continued: "I missed talking to you. I missed—I missed _family._"

"Yeah, well, Castiel, family's not the most important thing in the world, you know," he muttered finally. Castiel felt his heart drop to the pit of stomach and lie there, thumping and making his whole chest ache even though he felt the pangs of anger and betrayal and sadness roaring through his stomach. He missed Balthazar. He missed him so much, and here he was—and he didn't really want anything to do with him. Or maybe he did, but he sure as hell wasn't showing it.

Castiel sipped his tea again but tasted nothing, either because his brother made really shitty tea or because he wasn't really focusing on it, though he suspected it was both. He wished he'd just stayed with Gabriel back at the motel. Maybe he wouldn't have found Balthazar, which was great even if he was being distant, but Gabriel would be _safe_ and he wouldn't be faced with all this… this… Castiel wasn't sure what to call it, so he settled on guilt.

"Look, Balthazar, whatever," he said, getting angry because it wasn't fair that he felt guilty when he'd done _nothing_ to Balthazar, when he was being faced with being utterly alone to look for their brother. "Be pissed off at me, whatever. Doesn't really matter that _you're_ the one that left _me_ and changed your fucking number without telling me and left me here and just—no! No! I did nothing to you, Balthy! I fucking raised you, and now you're pushing me away over _nothing_, for _years,_ and I just want you to help me find our little brother so I'm not alone. And _I_ feel shitty. Fuck you, Balthazar. God, I don't know what college has done to you, but I fucking hate it."

Balthazar looked up at him. "I don't remember you being one for the feeling-to-feeling chats, but if that's what we're doing, then did you ever consider that I thought you were back with Mom? And I just can't deal with the life anymore? And I knew you'd just suck me back into it, even if you didn't want to, _like you're doing now?_" he snapped, and somehow he made Castiel feel even worse than he did before. He had wanted Balthazar to speak, but now he wished he hadn't at all. The silence while they awkwardly drank their flavorless tea was much better than this.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly. "You could've called." He didn't know what else to say. He didn't know how to convey all he was feeling, because he didn't usually like feeling-to-feeling chats.

"Castiel," Balthazar said with a sigh, looking down at the table and then over at the wall next to them. "I can't do this. I _can't._ I'll help you find Gabriel, okay? And I'll keep in touch with you, because you're right, it was wrong of me to disappear as wholly as I did, but please don't drag this shit to me anymore after this. Please. You can come see me all you like. Hell, if you need it, you can come live here and look for a job for a while and get your own house and drop out of the stupid hunters' life. Just keep me out of it, Castiel."

He didn't plan to do any of the dropping-out-of-the-hunting-life crap, but he nodded thoughtfully. "Thank you," he said. "Thank you, thank you, thank you."

"Well, I can't exactly just let our brother get kidnapped like this, can I?"

"No, you really can't," he said. He stood up. "Do you have a laptop?"

"Yeah, in my bag," he said. "I'll go get it."

So he did, and they spent a long time sitting on Balthazar's couch scrolling endlessly through Google, looking for anything in the area around where Gabriel went missing, any violent deaths—thank God there were none of those—or anything else strange and supernatural at all. It looked hopeless, but it was only the second day since he'd been missing, so they decided not to get too desperate yet.

Castiel wasn't sure if Balthazar was thinking about it or not, but they hadn't actually talked in two years and the first time they did it was because Gabriel was _gone._ He missed their bratty little brother so much it hurt, worse than the pangs he felt in his chest when he first started talking to Balthazar.

"Have you talked to Bobby yet?" he asked, and Castiel realized he'd completely forgotten their sort-of-uncle Bobby Singer. He'd taken care of them a lot when they were younger, before Castiel could really watch Gabriel and Balthazar, and then many times after if their mom took up a case in the area, which she seemed to do kind of a lot, knowing of their fondness for the old drunk.

"No," he said, pulling out his phone. "I'll do that now."

Balthazar nodded, watching as he dialed Bobby's number and put the phone up to his ear. It rung a few times before Bobby answered. "Castiel? Haven't heard from you in a while," said the voice on the other end. "Whatcha up to?"

"Look, Bobby," Castiel started out. "Okay, I was on a hunt and Gabe wasn't feeling well, so I left him at the motel. When I came back he was gone, his phone disconnected. I'm in California now. Balthazar's here."

"Balthazar?" Bobby said on the other end, sounding shocked. "Shit, boy, put him on."

Castiel did as he was told, handing the phone over to his brother. "He wants to talk."

Balthazar put the phone up to his ear but Castiel leaned toward it slightly so he could hear.

It was mostly just Bobby yelling at Balthazar for disappearing for so long and then Balthazar apologizing over and over and over, much more sincerely than when he'd been apologizing to Castiel. Then it was Bobby saying how much he'd missed him and asking what they knew about Gabriel's disappearance and how much Balthazar was helping. Castiel stopped listening after a second.

…..

A couple days later they caught wind of some demonic activity a few cities away from where Gabriel disappeared. It was Friday, so Castiel waited impatiently for Balthazar to get out of class, agreeing—after a lot of arguing—to wait until his classes were over before they went out to find their brother. _Their freaking brother._

As soon as he was out, he said goodbye to Jess, and they got their things together, they were on the road, listening to classical music as they sped down the road. Castiel went faster than he'd ever gone, and he was pretty good about going damn fast.

Castiel and Balthazar took turns driving so it was nonstop, straight to their first clue at Gabriel. He was anxious whenever he was awake, and he hated stopping even though he knew that they had to eat, had to pee, had to do all of that. Most meals were bags of chips and Mountain Dews in the car—after telling Balthazar strictly that if he got a single crumb on the seats he'd flip out—and most bathroom breaks were short and Castiel rushed his little brother along when he dawdled, repeatedly receiving the same annoyed "_Hang on_ a goddamn second, Castiel!"

They got into Omaha around three the next day, which was making really good time. They hadn't talked much in the first few hours, but toward the end it all flew by as they talked about their years apart. Balthazar talked about Jess so thoughtfully, so carefully, that, to Castiel, it felt like she was a treasure worthy of being in a museum, and he realizes just how in love Balthazar was. He realized he couldn't take him away from that on these long road trips cross-country. He was his older brother, and it was his job to give him the best life possible. Balthazar's best chance at a good life was back in California, with Jess, not here in the Impala with him.

"We're not going to be back by Monday," he mentioned suddenly as they pulled out of Omaha. He sighed. "It's already Saturday, and it's going to be about another day before we get to Punxsutawney. At best, I'd say we'll be back by Wednesday or Thursday."

"So you were really sick, didn't feel like going to class," he said, shrugging. "Couple days won't hurt, right?"

"No, they won't hurt school-wise, but I can't use the 'I was sick' excuse on Jess," he said. "She'll know and she'll get suspicious when I don't come home. Castiel, you should have told me how far away you guys had been. If I'd known you'd been all the way in _Pennsylvania,_ I could've at least told Jess a better lie than we're going to see our mom in this rough time."

He shrugged. He didn't see what was so wrong about pulling another lie out of his ass if he'd already done it, but Balthazar didn't seem to like the idea of having to lie to Jess at all. He also felt a little bitter about the fact that he'd never abandon her even for an extra couple of days, whereas he'd left Castiel for _two years_ for no reason.

"Balthazar, if I'd have told you, you wouldn't have come," he said. "I can't do this alone. I need you to help, and you seem to find school more important than your own fucking brother, so yeah, I'm a horrible fucking person because I didn't tell you how far we were going." He didn't want to fight more, but he was so ticked off that he couldn't help but snap this at his brother.

Balthazar's face turned cold and stony, but his jaw clamped shut and he looked out the window, away from Castiel. He leaned that way for a long time. The next time he moved out of the position was when his head lolled down because he was asleep. Castiel looked over at him, saying nothing. He let out a heavy sigh and changed the music. Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture just didn't exactly fit the mood right then. He was going to turn on a quiet song but somehow found himself playing Lynyrd Skynyrd. He wasn't particularly fond of the song or the artist, but he kept it on, remembering how Gabriel loved the song and whenever it came on, he'd sing along to it—loudly and _very_ badly, but Castiel would smile and laugh and try to sing along all the same.

…..

Around one in the afternoon on Sunday, they got out of the Impala and stretched, checking into a motel near where they'd heard of the demonic activity. Castiel hoped whatever it was, it was still there. He hoped that Gabriel was there, alive. He knew that if demons had him, he certainly wouldn't be well, so he was just going for alive.

Both of them were sick of driving, so they walked to the big abandoned factory on the very outskirts of the city. No one was around so it was easy to break in. It didn't look like it had been broken into recently, but he knew most demons could teleport and so they wouldn't have needed to break in. He kept faith that they would find their brother, finding reassurance in being able to feel where his canteens of holy water and gun were. He recited exorcisms over and over in his head to make sure he knew them. He envisioned a devil's trap so he'd be able to draw it in a rush without a reference picture.

They were going in without a decent plan, likely outnumbered, with inferior weapons. The likelihood of their survival looked _great._

"Castiel," Balthazar whispered, nodding his head toward an opened door with light spilling through it. Castiel nodded and held his gun up, his heart thumping quickly in his chest as he walked toward the door. He got beside it and leaned back against the wall, bracing himself. Then he turned and, pointing his gun out, took a step into the room. As it turned out, it was just a very startled homeless man, decidedly not a demon. When they found he didn't react to the homeless man, and he'd said there had been nothing in the building for the few days he'd holed up there, they gave him a twenty dollar bill and left the building.

They sat in the Impala and thought over where they'd gone wrong. Castiel knew that this was the exact building, the exact town, the exact _everything_, where demon activity was: flickering lights the reports of disappearing people in front of the building.

"Let's just go back to California," Balthazar said. "We can look for a new lead there."

"No," Castiel said. "We have to keep looking for Gabriel. We _have_ to."

His little brother looked at him with a small frown. "Look, Cassie, I'm not heartless," he said quietly. "I want to look for him too. It's just—okay, hear me out here. It's just that—"

"Don't you dare say you think he's dead," he snapped, feeling a bubble of anger swim up and take over him. His deep blue eyes burned with anger and he glared intensely at his brother. "Don't you _dare_ assume that in the first place, and don't say it like he's just fucking road kill or something. This is our brother, Balthazar."

"You've said this repeatedly," he said quietly. "I said hear me out."

"I'm so done with you," Castiel said, shaking his head and turning the ignition. He wasn't sure where he was going to drive, but he had to get away from this building, this reminder of his failure. Any failure was monumental because it put them further back in the search for Gabriel. Staring at the building where he was supposed to be just hurt too much because he wasn't there. He drove away from it, waiting for Balthazar to respond, and when he didn't, he said, "I'll take you back to California and I'll go to Sioux Falls. Bobby probably actually cares."

"I care—"

"No, you don't!" Castiel said, looking over at him for a second. "You don't care! You are not the Balthazar I knew, and I don't want to know who you are because you sound like a coward. You don't give up on family, Balthy, you just don't. I don't care if you say that family is not the most important thing. If your family needs you, if your family is good to you, and it needs you, you don't give up on it."

"Yeah well, my family wasn't really good to me when it ran off to other states and left me with someone only two years older than me," he snapped back, obviously fed up with Castiel's outbursts, but he hardly cared.

"That was _Mom!_" Castiel said. "What did Gabriel and I _ever_ do to you? You've always been the best child, Balthazar, even if Mom didn't recognize it!"

"You don't understand," Balthazar muttered, shaking his head and looking out the window. "You don't know what it's like to finally step away."

"No, I don't, because I didn't give up on Gabe. I could've gone to college but I didn't."

"Because Mom said no."

"Because I knew I had to watch you guys."

Balthazar let out a bitter chuckle. "I was sixteen and Gabe was fourteen. We could've got along fine," he said, looking over at him. "We didn't need you."

Castiel wasn't sure how badly Balthazar meant for that to sting, but he knew that it was meant to at least a little. It stung badly, and it worked its way into his mother's instilled mantra of _You are broken, Castiel_, and it sat there, and between every few lines of the normal hatred he piled on himself was a new phrase: _We didn't need you. You are useless, everyone things so. We. Didn't. Need. You._

…..

They got all the way to Joliet, Illinois before there was a change of plans.

They had argued a lot along the way, and after a couple of hours it gave way to silence. The silence, deafening because Castiel refused to turn on music, wanting Balthazar to drown in the silence, gave way to talking. Simply talking.

"Please don't start another argument, but I just think… if it's something supernatural, and it undoubtedly is, we might not find him, and I'm trying to desensitize myself to it, Cassie," he said quietly, letting out a heavy breath and looking over at him. "That's what we've been taught to do our entire lives: desensitize ourselves. So yeah, in a couple of days, if we still haven't found him, I'm going to start to panic. It's inevitable and I know it. And I don't want to stop looking for him. I just… I don't want to be there if all we can find is his body."

Castiel felt a shiver creep down his spine at the thought. He squinted his eyes out at the road, trying to get the image to go away, but it wouldn't: there was Gabriel's body, lying face-up. His eyes were empty but open, their gold reflecting out, shimmering as the sun beat down. The stench of dead body permeated the image. He could practically feel the heaviness in the air, the tears that would fall down his cheeks, could hear the screams he'd emit, the vehement cries, the promises that he would _end_ whoever hurt his little brother. His abdomen was drenched in blood, claw marks making his skin look fleshy and ready to be cooked, like meat, not his little brother.

He could imagine the moment, but he couldn't imagine the aftermath. What would the world be like if it contained no Gabriel Novaks? What would the world be like if there was a girl or a guy out there that was meant to love him more than anything else that had to settle on someone that was not Gabriel Novak and was nowhere close to as amazing? What would the world be like without the glimmer of his oddly golden eyes in the sun?

What would he be like? What would he be like, knowing he'd failed in watching them? What would his mom say? Would she bring up their conversation on the hood of the Impala? Would she hit him like she used to, cause him to curl up on his bed, screaming at him? "You let the only thing in the world that actually matters die, and you are _useless_ for it." He could feel her anger in the air better than he could feel his own hands on the steering wheel of the car.

"Desensitization doesn't help," Castiel said with a sigh, pushing past the thoughts after a moment. "When you prolong the inevitable, the inevitable feels worse. And it's just inhumane. You're supposed to feel pain."

"But I don't want to," he said quietly.

Castiel looked over at him. His little brother's blue eyes were shining, watery. Castiel wanted to wrap him in a hug and tell him he'd be okay like he did when he was younger and he'd had a nightmare. He looked so young right then. It was hard for Castiel to believe that this twenty-year-old man wasn't six years old and scared out of his wits of the monsters their mom fought being in the closet, the little boy that woke up crying from dreams of their father dying on the ceiling. He always said all he remembered was the flames, so what were those nightmares like? Flames enveloping the house and maybe him too? Maybe all of them?

They were in Gary, Indiana, now. He pulled over they got chips and Mountain Dews and sat out in the Impala.

"I miss Jess," Balthazar sighed. "I miss Gabe too. I miss Bobby. I miss you."

"I'm right here," Castiel said, looking over at him as he ate a Dorito.

Balthazar shook his head. "No, I miss the you that I'd sit down with and talk to for forever," he said. "I miss when we didn't argue constantly."

"I think we're just arguing so much now because there's a lot to resolve between us," Castiel said. "I mean, _two years,_ Balthazar."

"I know, I know," he said, sighing. "It doesn't help that we both such a resolving stuff."

"No, that doesn't help." He opened his Mountain Dew and took a big drink of it. "Look, we're going to be on the road for a while now. Why don't we just fix it all on the ride there? See if we can, you know? We can argue, yell at each other, or just fucking cry like we're two-year-olds, okay? I want to get past this."

"I do too." He nodded, leaning against his door, looking over at him. "Let's try that."

When they pulled away from the gas station, heading out of Gary, they decided to do a you-ask-a-question-I-ask-a-question thing. Castiel, being the eldest, asked a question first. He didn't want to put the heaviest question out there first, but he did.

"So. Did you honestly just leave to get away from the life, or was there more?" he asked, hoping there wasn't more. But he needed to know. That was what this was for.

"Okay, Cassie, look. I know all of this sounds screwed up, and I probably seem like douche of the year." He paused, as if expecting Castiel to say he wasn't. But he was, really. He was douche of the decade. "All right. Well, um… okay. I just wanted out, and I went about it the wrong way. I've gone about _everything_ the wrong way. I know I've done a lot of shitty things, and I know there isn't much I can do to make up for them, but I'm sorry. I really am."

Castiel looked down, sighing slightly. "I'm sorry too," he said. "I shouldn't have gotten so angry. I should have understood."

They sat silently for a minute. Castiel could feel the weight of this silence. It was different. This wasn't angry-heavy. It was thoughtful-heavy. He wasn't sure exactly what Balthazar was thinking about, but somehow, he knew everything rested in the hands of this silence. If something pissed him off, that could be it. They'd argue all the way back to Stanford and they wouldn't keep in touch. He wouldn't see Balthazar ever again. He would die without ever seeing or hearing from him again.

Among that horrible thought came the nightmare of not finding Gabriel either. _Alone._ Sure, he'd have Bobby, and Bobby was great, but… But he wasn't his Gabriel or Balthazar. Bobby was family—and fuck anybody who said otherwise—but he wasn't a brother. Castiel needed his brothers to get through life more than he needed anything. The two years he'd gone without Balthazar had, at times, been the loneliest years he'd ever lived, even though Gabriel was at his side. Even though he wouldn't outright admit it to himself, he was hopelessly dependent on them because what kind of life did he have to live if he was living it for himself? He hated himself. He did so many things wrong, screwed up so much, let so many people down.

Castiel nudged Balthazar slightly. "Look, we're in Hammond," he said as they entered the city. "Remember when we came here when you were eight?"

"Yeah," Balthazar said reminiscently. He looked down at his hands in his lap. "It was Halloween, right?"

"Yeah," Castiel answered, smiling fondly as he stared out at the city they were driving through. "I was going as Spiderman and you were supposed to go as Batman and Gabriel was going to be Superman."

Balthazar nodded. Castiel glanced over at him and saw that there was a smile blooming on his face too. He looked out the window. He couldn't remember much of the town. He had only been eight and they hadn't stayed long, but the memory was one of Castiel's favorites.

"I went to go see if you guys were ready, and you were both wearing really bad costumes of me," he said, smiling.

"I remember drawing the masks with Gabriel," he said. "I don't know why, but I distinctively remember telling Gabriel that he was using the wrong color of blue for your eyes."

Castiel chuckled. "You guys drew eyes the size of fists!"

"It was so we could actually cut out eyeholes," he said, smiling and looking up at his older brother. "I was eight, he was six. We didn't think it through. You were just really sad that week and I wanted to make you happy. And Gabe—he just went with it because he said you were a better hero than Superman. And I agreed you were a better hero than Spiderman."

He looked over at him. There was nothing to say, so he just smiled out at the road slightly, the memory making him happy.

When they got to Joliet half an hour later, pulling over to get more Mountain Dew, Balthazar turned to him and said, "Fuck it, man. A couple days won't hurt. Don't take me to Stanford."

Castiel wasn't sure what to do. Awkwardly but happily he smiled. "Right," he said, nodding. "Where do we go, then?"

"I don't know. Bobby's, I guess," he said, opening his soda. He took a big drink, twisted the lid back on, and leaned back in his seat, looking up at the roof of the Impala. "Anywhere we can find Gabe. He needs us, and you need me. So I'm going to help."

The trip to Sioux Falls was like old times, and Castiel was happier than he thought he ever could be, and at the same time there was still something hanging over them: Gabriel was still gone, and their only lead had turned out to be just bad streetlights and a really quick homeless man. Their search for him wasn't looking very good.

They ended up sleeping overnight in a shitty motel like old times. Right before they fell asleep, with the lights off, Castiel asked, "Hey, Balthy, how's college?"

He was confused at first. "What?" he asked tiredly.

"How's college?" Castiel repeated. He stared up at the ceiling as his eyes adjusted so he could see the pattern on it through the darkness. Just meaningless lines and swirls, easy to trace with his eyes and get lost in.

"It's… it's good," he said quietly. "I really want to be a doctor, Castiel. I want to help people, but I don't want to be a hunter."

Castiel nodded thoughtfully. "I wish I went. I don't know what I would've done though."

"You'd make a good teacher," Balthazar said quietly. Castiel could hear the amusement in his brother's voice, but somehow, despite this, he still sounded like he genuinely believed that Castiel would be a good teacher.

He shook his head. "No. I hate kids," he said.

"Castiel, you raised three, if you include yourself," he said. "You're super patient and you're awesome with kids. And you're good at teaching. And you're damn smart. You'd be a hell of a teacher."

He thought that over for a second. "No," he said after a moment. He wasn't sure why, but he just knew he _couldn't_ be.

"Yeah. Night, Cassie."

"Night, Balthazar." He flipped onto his side and stared at the wall. His dreams were full of images of Gabriel screaming.


	3. Chapter 3

**Thank you to everyone who is reading the story and I hope everyone likes the new chapter and reviews and all that.**

* * *

_"Night, Balthazar." He flipped onto his side and stared at the wall. His dreams were full of images of Gabriel screaming._

* * *

When Castiel woke up, his first thought was to tell Gabriel to shut his goddamn music off, because there was Kansas playing excessively loud and it was annoying the shit out of him while he was trying to sleep. He pulled the blanket over his head, leaving a little hole for his nose and mouth, and he muttered loudly, "Fucking loud enough, G—"

He woke up fully, his eyes opening and a pang hitting him hard in the chest. Gabriel was gone. It was Balthazar playing the Kansas.

"What? Sorry," he heard his younger brother say, turning the song down. "I actually like Kansas, so… You okay?"

Castiel was looking down at his lap as he sat up, the blanket falling down from his head into his lap. Any other time it would have looked vaguely funny, seeing a grown man wrapped up in his own blanket igloo with a pouty face, but both of them knew it was because he was thinking of Gabriel, and that the face wasn't so much pouty was it was a mixture of anger and sadness.

He just wanted to find his little brother before it was too late. It had been five days since he last saw Gabriel and each day made the pain of loss worse and worse, his heart willing him to be alive but his brain slowly resigning to the fact that if they didn't find him soon—and _damn _soon—he'd be gone for good.

And still they'd look. Of course they'd still look. If they still hadn't found him months from now, _they'd still look._ Maybe Balthazar would be back at Stanford, and Castiel would be mostly holed up at Bobby's, but surely Balthazar would call him sometimes. In the summer he'd probably help. Maybe on breaks sometimes. Bobby surely would help a lot, even after telling Castiel for months that _He's gone, boy. I'm sorry,_ even after trying desperately to get Castiel to move on, _he'd look._ Castiel wanted to find him or find a body. Because Gabriel needed him and if he was going to do one goddamn thing right in his life, it'd be finding his asswipe of a little brother.

"C'mon, let's get breakfast and get to Bobby's," Castiel said quietly, standing up. Balthazar said he'd been up for an hour or so and was showered and already ready to head out. Castiel showered quickly and the two of them got into the Impala, driving to the first diner they saw. Shitty motels, shitty diners, shitty schools, shitty bars—that was Castiel's life. For once, he felt like having something quality, but he knew he wouldn't fit in there all.

They ate. The food was actually decent, which was good. It wasn't like they couldn't afford to go to some fancy ass buffet that only the snooty people in town went to, because hell, Castiel could get all the money he damn well wanted, but he guessed that old habits die hard. And besides, he really _wouldn't_ fit in there. He was kind of fond of his shitty diner food.

So maybe quality food wasn't necessary. Maybe just a quality motel here and there? He really wasn't that hard to please.

They hopped back in the Impala and began their final stretch to Bobby's. It would be about four or five hours before they got there. Four or five hours of random talks and Mountain Dew stops and Doritos and Funyuns and Lays and Ruffles and goddamn it _why don't they mix it up and get Dr. Pepper for once? _They still got Mountain Dew. It was a thing. It was just one of their _things._

Gabriel would get the goddamn Dr. Pepper. Maybe that was why they didn't want it.

"Tell me about Jess," Castiel asked at the mark of the first hour of their road trip of the day.

"What do you want to know?" Balthazar asked, looking over at him.

"Anything. Be sappy, if you really want," he said, smiling at his brother. "I don't mind sappy."

"I know you don't. You can be a major sap."

"Psh," Castiel said, rolling his eyes. "Jess. Talk."

"Well," he said, shrugging. "We met at Stanford, obviously. And we just—we hit it off. I immediately thought she was gorgeous, because God, she is. She's just—it was so easy, to fall in love with her, and so it didn't take long before we started dating and then we decided that after college, if we were still together—and we really think we will be—we're going to get married." He smiled happily, shrugging a little bit. "And, I mean, we're _Novaks,_ it's kind of impractical to try to have a family, isn't it? But if there's one person I want to say to hell with it, let's be together forever to, it's her."

"And I'm the sap."

"Shut up," he said, smiling more and punching Castiel's arm.

"So," he said, because there was just something about that. Balthazar—_married._ Balthazar—_dad._ Balthazar with _kids_—fuck, that was weird, but what was even weird was he could see them. They'd be blonde and blue-eyed for sure, if he had them with Jess. He pictured them with her smile, but his nose. Definitely, though his nose wasn't weirder than anyone else's nose, they'd have an undeniably _Balthazar_-nose. He wasn't sure why this was what he thought, but it just was.

_Uncle Cassie._ Weird.

"So," he started again, realizing he'd trailed off for a second. "Married."

"Yes. Settled down. Job. Money," he said, looking over at Castiel. "Doesn't it sound nice, though? Don't you want that?"

Castiel looked over at him and shrugged. It did sound nice, a settled life with a nice girl—_or a nice guy,_ his mind reminded him, because yeah, he liked girls more, but also yeah, he liked guys—with a house and bills and _Do we wanna have kids/adopt?_ and _Damn it, it was your week to take the trashcan out front,_ and— But it was all stupid. There was no one he could love long-term and unconditionally like that. Or, rather, there was no one that could love _him _long-term and unconditionally like that.

"Castiel," Balthazar said after a second, smiling. "You still wear that thing?"

"What thing?" he asked.

"The amulet thing Gabe and I got you," he said, looking at it fondly. Castiel looked down at it.

"Oh. Yeah. I love this thing," he said. "You've only been gone two years, and you know I always wore it before." He shrugged.

"And that stupid watch and the stupid bracelets," he said, smiling more and looking at Castiel's wrist. He did have an unchanging set of accessories: his amulet, the simple black bracelets he got from Bobby (they were nothing special, just something Bobby didn't want or need anymore and so Castiel kept them), the beaded bracelet from his mom, the watch that he simply _liked_, and his dad's wedding ring. And he supposed he also wore his dad's old leather jacket a lot too.

Castiel shrugged. "I've got something from everyone I love here," he said. "It's kind of… comforting."

"Even Dad," Balthazar remarked quietly, looking down at the ring.

"Yeah," he said. "Even Dad."

When the second hour came rolling around, Balthazar was passed out with his full Mountain Dew bottle resting in his lap. His mouth hung open and occasionally puffs of breath that didn't quite develop into actual snores escaped him. Castiel was trying to picture his little brother sitting on the couch with his laptop, girlfriend/fiancée sitting next to him with her laptop or whatever while they talked about their least favorite professor or talked about what papers they had due or how much they wanted to go here or there or do this or that when college was over. He couldn't picture _Balthazar_ delved that far into a relationship, couldn't imagine him falling so far in love with someone that living without them seemed impossible.

Was it Balthazar he couldn't picture committed so wholly into something as permanent as that? Or was it himself? Ultimately, he knew that after his mom said he couldn't go to college, he lived in Balthazar's shoes. He urged him forward mostly because that was what was good for him and that was what he wanted, but some selfish part of him pushed him forward because he wanted to, vicariously, go to college through his little brother.

Toward the end of hour two, the younger Novak woke up with a start, the Mountain Dew rolling out of his lap. He looked over at Castiel and blinked for a second before seeming to realize where he was. He put his hand to his forehead. "Fuck, headache," he muttered.

Castiel looked over at him. "You okay?"

"Yeah, s'just the stress," he said, waving it off. "How close're we to Sioux Falls?"

"Few more hours."

"Fun."

"Yeah."

They didn't talk while they waited for Balthazar's headache to fade away. When it finally had, he instigated the conversation. "So I was out for, what, forty-five minutes?" he asked.

"Yeah, why?" Castiel asked.

He shrugged. "I'm just wondering. My drink is kinda flat and I've got to piss now."

"Right. Want me to stop somewhere?"

"Please," he said.

Castiel drove a ways until they found a highway that wasn't what could _perfectly_ be described as the middle of nowhere, woods on either side of them and no towns in sight. He took the first exit that led to a gas station and they stopped, did their business, replenished their drink supplies. This time Castiel got water. Mountain Dew was nice when he was tired but not too tired, but he was really awake that day and it was getting old to get a bottle of Mountain Dew at every stop. Time to switch it up.

They got back out to the Impala but just stood for a second. They had driven so much that Balthazar was beginning to get sick of sitting. Castiel was used to driving for longer, but he didn't mind the break to stretch his legs and stand for a minute while Balthazar talked about some dream about his professor assigning them to do something monumental so, because of his burning hatred for the song by Celine Dion, he created a time machine and un-sunk the Titanic. As it happened, the Titanic was a pretty big part of history, so some lady with a clipboard came and started killing people that were on the Titanic. He got an A.

"That's the weirdest dream I've ever heard of," he said, smiling slightly. "I'm going to play My Heart Will Go On to piss you off now."

"Don't you dare."

Castiel laughed. "I wouldn't torture you like that."

...

The drive went on like that all the way to Bobby's. It was nice. Castiel would have been genuinely happy if it weren't for the fact that his youngest brother could easily be dead. That dampened the mood just a bit.

Bobby's home was open for the two boys, of course. They sat on his couch and kicked up their feet and drank beer with Bobby looking and looking for anything on Gabriel's disappearance, but just like they had found nothing, so did he. It was depressing. Bobby was quiet, even when Balthazar blurted out about Jess, just to see if he'd react. He didn't. He was immersed in whatever he was reading.

"Shut it, I think I've got something," he said quietly, eyes moving back and forth across the screen as he read. After a moment, he shook his head and, with a heavy sigh, he finally stood up, grabbed a beer of his own, and assessed the two boys standing in front of him. "Sorry, I'd been looking through that forever and it seemed like something on your brother." The boys shrugged. Whatever it took to find Gabriel. "Well, come on, hug me, ya idjits."

Castiel hadn't seen him in a while, but it was nowhere near as long as Balthazar. Still, he hugged them with equal vigor, like any regular dad happy to see his sons after a long time. Bobby had always been a father figure to them, even when they called him "Uncle Bobby." Their mom just didn't like hearing about anyone trying to do better than she was at parenting them.

It wasn't hard to parent better than her.

_She tried her hardest,_ Castiel reminded himself. _What she did, she did because she thought it was the right thing to do._

"Well, how long are you two staying?" he asked. "Haven't you got fancy college classes to get back to, boy?" He looked at Balthazar, not smiling but radiating pride. Like a dad. Like he was _their_ dad. God, having Bobby act so fatherly then was so comforting. He needed a father figure. He needed someone to hug him and give him beer and feed him and fuss over him. He needed someone to take over the work of looking for Gabriel. He needed someone to lift the weight of protecting and watching and worrying off his shoulders and do all that protecting and watching and worrying for him.

"Yeah, so just a couple days," Balthazar told him. "Then I'll be back to school, but I'll help when I can."

"Right. Well, then, how's that going? School?"

"Oh, it's good," he said fondly. "I get decent grades."

"Oh, shit, Balthazar, what you consider decent grades got you scholarships," Bobby said. "What's 'decent grades,' then? As and Bs?"

"Well, yeah…"

Bobby smiled now and shook his head. "That's _good._"

"More Bs than As this semester so far…"

He rolled his eyes. "I couldn't get As worth a shit when I was in school," he said. "I got a B if I was lucky."

"Not because you're not smart," Balthazar said. "You're smart."

"I know I'm smart. But, kid, you're way smarter."

"Thanks, Bobby," he said quietly.

Castiel was glad that his brother was getting this sort of attention from Bobby. As mad as he was at him for leaving for so long, and as wrong of a decision that was for him to isolate himself from them entirely, he knew that it was over now and they couldn't dwell on it. He wanted his brother to know that it was okay for him to come back into the little family they had. He wanted him to know that there were some things that they had needed to talk about, but after that, there were no hard feelings. He just didn't want to lose him again.

He didn't expect it when Bobby then turned to Castiel and said, "So how was hunting going?"

"Oh… good, why?" he asked, frowning at him.

"Just wondering. You know this ain't your fault, right? I don't want you to go moping around thinking that, 'cause it's not," he said. "We're going to find the son of a bitch whose fault this is, and we'll take care of them when that time comes. I've heard you story, and it sounds like you might blame yourself, but don't."

Castiel shrugged. He had blamed himself. _If you hadn't left him… If you had just dropped the case… If you had made sure he was going to be safe…_ But he smiled slightly at Bobby, making sure it seemed grateful, like he believed it. "Thanks, Bobby."

He was so good at telling lies.

...

Bobby looked. In the meantime, Balthazar and Castiel took up a case an hour outside of Sioux Falls. Hearts ripped out. They knew it was werewolves so they loaded themselves up with silver and smiled at the family as they pretended to be concerned friends of the college students that fell victim to this horrible tragedy. They won their hearts, and as it turned out, Balthazar was still surprisingly good at this. Actually, he did better at winning the parents over than Castiel did, even making his eyes water, which Castiel could do too, but he hadn't thought of it.

"Yes, come in," they said in weepy voices, ushering them onto their couches. "I think I've heard of a Chad and a Ben…"

They couldn't exactly waltz up with names like Castiel and Balthazar and pretend like they were good friends of the victims. You'd probably vaguely remember names like Castiel and Balthazar.

Their mom said something about a girlfriend of one of the victims'. "Lynda called yesterday," she said quietly. "She's so upset…"

"I'd imagine. We all are," Castiel said softly, sympathetically, but also in a way that said he was grieving too, just less than the parents. Because, obviously, they weren't as close to the victims as their parents were.

"Did Lynda sound weird?" Castiel asked.

The mom looked up. "Why?" she asked with a little frown.

"She's been acting weird," Balthazar said.

The mom swallowed. "Well, she… seemed out of it," she said quietly. "And… the night of the… murder—" She choked back a sob, closing her eyes tightly as tears fell down her cheeks. Castiel felt so bad for her but if he got hung up in that, he wouldn't ever finish the case. His mom taught him that. "He called me, saying he had no clue where Lynda had gotten to and she texted him saying something like 'Help!' Malia was going over to help him look… And then… But obviously it wasn't Lynda."

"Obviously," Castiel agreed.

"Well, we're sorry to intrude," Balthazar said. "We just wanted to come by and say we were sorry."

"Thank you, boys," she said softly.

They left the house and got in the Impala. "To Lynda's?" Castiel asked.

"She'd be at the college," Balthazar said.

"Exactly. Back to Sioux Falls," he said. So they drove back to Sioux Falls. Half an hour later, they got out at the University of Sioux Falls and navigated their way through the students frantic to get to their classes, asking around until they caught wind of one Lynda Winston.

Lynda Winston was a wreck. A sniffling, antsy, nervous wreck. She kept looking at their pockets like she expecting for a gun to show up—_we keep our guns a little higher,_ Castiel thought—and she kept looking over her shoulder like the ghost of Malia and Scott Oswald would just appear behind her.

Castiel was sure she was the werewolf. This was an easy case.

You couldn't exactly just swipe a silver knife across someone's arm in the middle of a college campus though. And then, if they managed it, and she was the werewolf, you definitely couldn't _murder_ someone in the middle of a college campus. So they had to wait.

"I'm going to feel so bad if we have to kill her," Balthazar sighed. "She's _my age,_ Castiel."

"I'm aware," he said. "She's a monster though."

"Yeah, but she can't even _control it_," he said.

"Exactly, Balthy. It sucks, but saving her life will mean that a lot of other people lose theirs. One person is not worth twenty or thirty."

They followed her back to her apartment. Around eleven at night (_"Castiel, she's not coming out. Can we go?" "Castiel, it's been three hours." "Castiel, Bobby's saying it's probably not her." "Castiel, come _on._"_), she jumped out of her window, wolfed out. They jumped out of the Impala, pulling out their guns filled with silver bullets. When she caught sight of them, she hissed.

"_Novaks,_" she breathed out in a disgusted voice, "you two are at the eye of the storm."

"_What?_" Balthazar said, frowning.

"She's stalling," Castiel said. He didn't know that werewolves could be awake enough in their wolf forms to stall.

"No. The two of you—you are going to _rot—_"

Castiel was disturbed. He raised his gun and shot her in the heart, and the two of them climbed into the Impala and drove back to Bobby's, one thought running through his head the whole time: _What the hell?_

They told Bobby about the case. Balthazar asked, "What do you think that means? She knew we're Novaks. And 'eye of the storm'? What? And I'd _like_ to have known what she meant by we're going to 'rot,' but Castiel killed her."

He rolled his eyes. "It was creepy. She was going to get the advantage if we kept listening to her like that. So I shot her."

"We had guns. She wasn't going to get the advantage."

Castiel shrugged slightly. "Whatever, it doesn't matter. What else would she have said?" he asked.

"I don't know. Maybe elaborated on the whole _rot_ thing?" Balthazar said, raising an eyebrow at Castiel. "Hell, maybe something about Gabriel, but you went and shot her!"

"Stop arguing like a bunch of five-year-olds," Bobby said. They both looked up at him. "Whatever it was, we don't need to worry about it right now. You got the werewolf. Balthazar, when do d'you need to be back to Stanford by?"

"I don't know. Soon, probably," he said, looking up at Bobby.

"Then, Castiel, drive your damn brother to California and then get your ass back here and we'll work on Gabe," he said. "We'll call you if anything happens. I just don't like seeing you here when you should be at school."

Balthazar rolled his eyes slightly. "It's annoying when you're right. Let's leave in the morning."

"Yeah, I'm not driving all the way to California at midnight," Castiel said.

They stayed up a while longer, catching up and drinking beer and somehow sandwiches ended up being shoved at them by Bobby so they ate and then crawled tiredly up to their old rooms. Castiel fell asleep almost as soon as his head hit the pillow. He was just so _tired._

When he woke up, he showered, got dressed in something clean, had breakfast. Balthazar came down half an hour later, droopy-eyed but showered and dressed. Bobby had been up, reading through some book from his stacks and stacks everywhere. The old, messy house shouldn't have been so nice to be in. It should have a creepy, supernatural feel, but instead it was just… Well, if they had a home, this would be it. It just said _home._

...

It was a daylong trip to Stanford. It was a daylong trip back. He walked out to the Impala, taking one last glance at their apartment. He'd miss Balthazar. He knew they were keeping in touch now, but it almost felt like not enough. After last time, he didn't really trust Balthazar to go through with his promise to keep in touch with him and Bobby. He didn't trust him not to disappear entirely again, change his number and his college and then there would be no Jess to show him the way to his apartment in Stanford. There would be nothing. No finding him. No more brothers.

No more brothers.

_You two are at the eye of the storm._

Yeah, Castiel was feeling the brunt of that. He didn't even trust his own little brother not to lose him for good. He felt like just going and sitting down in his apartment and telling him he wasn't leaving until he was done with college. He felt like ensuring completely that he would _not_ leave him out of nowhere again.

That would be ridiculous though. You don't just sit in your brother's apartment and declare that you don't trust him so you're just going to sit there for good.

Just like you don't sit outside your brother's apartment for the same reason either.

He sighed and moved to back out of his parking spot when there was a reddish light out of the corner of his eye. He looked over and saw fire in the window of the apartments. His eyes widened and he jumped out of the Impala, running toward the building.

_That was Balthazar's apartment._

He ran into the building, pushing past people until he reached the door. It was locked. God fucking _damn it_, it was locked. He took a breath. He didn't have time to fucking knock. His brother's apartment was on fire. He was going on overdrive and all that he could think of was _Save Balthazar_ so it took him a second before the obvious solution came into his head.

_Kick down the fucking door, you idiot, _he snapped at himself.

He stepped back and then rammed his foot into the door. It knocked down. "Sir, you need to wait for the fire department," called someone's nasally voice from behind him, but he just flipped the person off before running quickly into the apartment.

"_Balthy!_" he shouted. Well, more like screamed desperately. He ran toward the bedroom, where the fire seemed to be coming from. The smoke alarm was beeping relentlessly. He pushed the door open quickly and saw Jess on the ceiling.

Jess. On the ceiling.

He felt a shudder run through him and for a second, staring up at Jess with wide, terrified eyes, he couldn't breathe. He saw his dad up there. He heard his mom screaming for him to get Gabriel and Balthazar the hell out of there. It was her voice that woke him up from his trance long enough to realize that _fuck_, if he didn't get Balthazar out of there now, they were both going to die.

But Balthazar was screaming Jess's name, staring up at the ceiling with wide eyes from the bed. The fire was running down the walls. The fire was eating away at their dresser. The fire was _everywhere._ It was burning everything and he felt himself slipping back into a haze. Jess's stomach was bleeding, just as his dad's had. She looked even more terrifying than his dad had. Her blonde hair was spread out over her head like a halo, but she was burning on a ceiling and halos were too innocent, too good, for the situation.

Her blue eyes were almost… _black._

Demon. She wasn't a demon. God, of course she wasn't a demon, it was just the way Dean was standing, but that was what was doing this. _Demon._ _The_ demon. The demon was near, probably watching them, and Castiel felt, again, like he couldn't breathe. The _thing_ that had killed his dad, ruined his life, was somewhere nearby.

_Fuck. Balthazar. Balthazar. Balthazar. _

He pulled Balthazar to his feet and felt his heart break for his little brother when he screamed, "No, let me go! Jess! _Jess, no!_"

He pulled him further out of the room as the flames licked their way across the bottom of the floor. It was growing. It was going to kill them.

"Balthazar, please, focus for a second," Castiel shouted in his ear. "She's gone, I'm sorry! We have to go!"

Balthazar would not listen to reason, and now he was struggling against Castiel's grip, so he pulled harder, yanking his little brother out of the room where his girlfriend, his _fiancée,_ was dying, burning on the ceiling at the hands of the son of a bitch that had killed their dad.

What did it have against their family?

He tugged him out of the apartment, and by that time, Balthazar was practically sobbing. The fire department was showing up. Castiel wondered what they would think about the girl on the ceiling briefly. Would she even be there when they went in? Or would the demon have moved her away by then?

"Jessica," he heard his brother's choked voice manage. He pulled him into a hug as the fire department rushed in. Even though she had been alive when Castiel had gone in there to get Balthazar, there was no hope for her, and he knew that. They both knew that so well, and though he barely knew her, it ached in Castiel's chest too as he hugged his crying brother, and the people that weren't from the fire department were looking on sympathetically when they got outside, ushered out of the building by a firefighter.

"I'm sorry for your loss," the nasally-voiced person said. "It was so brave of you to go in there and save him though—"

"You didn't think it was brave when you told me I was supposed to wait," Castiel said, glaring at her. He didn't want to talk to anyone. He didn't want to hear her voice. He just wanted to at Balthazar's shoulder more, reassuring him it would be okay, though he didn't know if it would be okay. What happens when someone you love like that dies, he wondered? What happens when you lose the person that you would dedicate everything to? What happens when the person you want to wake up to every morning isn't there the next time you wake up?

Castiel hoped the answer wasn't _You wither up and die. _Well, he knew it wasn't. Bobby Singer was living proof, but it would be lying to say he'd coped well after Karen died. He was a straight-up alcoholic.

"Cassie, I want to go to Bobby's," Balthazar breathed as they waited to be questioned, to be assessed, to be given stupid shock blankets but they _weren't in shock. _They just wanted to go back to Bobby's. The look in his little brother's eyes screamed, _Don't they know I just want to go home?_

Home. They needed a home. Castiel would be glad to call Bobby's place home while they needed it.

As the adrenaline of jumping into the burning building to save his brother subsided, he realized how tired he really was. His eyes drooped. When they were finally let go, he drove for a bit before deciding they needed to pull over and sleep at a motel.

I thought nothing could get worse than it had. I thought Balthazar couldn't shed anymore tears. But he did. And then he whispered, "Doesn't everyone know she died? Why doesn't everyone just _stop moving_ for a second?"

Castiel paused for a second. Then he opened his mouth, meaning to say something comforting. "Go to sleep, Balthy," he whispered out, and he flipped over on his side. There was nothing comforting to say.


	4. Chapter 4

**Woo, it's done. I could not for the life of me write Dean in a way that I liked. I don't love this, but it's better than my last two tries, and I'll adjust him as I write more of him. So here, I hope you like it. And review and favorite and all of that other great stuff. **

_Castiel paused for a second. Then he opened his mouth, meaning to say something comforting. "Go to sleep, Balthy," he whispered, and he flipped over on his side. There was nothing comforting to say._

* * *

The ride back to Bobby's consisted of the worst days of his life, not because it was unbearable to listen to Balthazar cry the whole time. He wanted to be there for his brother. He didn't mind the crying and the talking and the lack of talking. What bothered him through the trip was that his brother was suffering. He had lost too much. Castiel had tried to urge him to stay at Stanford, to finish college, but Balthazar insisted that he hunted. _Maybe in a few years I'll go back,_ he said. _But I can't now._

Castiel had to respect that.

All of his stuff was gone. He'd salvaged his laptop and some pictures and things from the parts of the apartment that hadn't been burned, but his clothes and the like were all gone. They would have to go shopping for him in Sioux Falls. And then they'd probably have to make the trip back soon enough to go to Jess's funeral, but Castiel wouldn't mind at all. It was for Balthy. He understood, and he was used to long, cross-country road trips anyway.

For now, he would only consult Bobby about Gabriel. He didn't want to pile two losses onto Balthazar's shoulder. When they called to tell Bobby what happened, he didn't mention Gabe at all. Bobby didn't mention how disappointed he probably was that Balthazar wouldn't be finishing college. Neither of them talked about how Balthazar was trapping himself back in the life, likely for good. That was how the life worked, after all: you get out when you're young or you never get out at all.

No one wanted to make him sadder than he was, but it didn't help much. He still cried. And Castiel was still haunted by something he remembered hearing Balthazar say on the way to Bobby's the other day: _And, I mean, we're _Novaks_, it's kind of impractical to try to have a family, isn't it? But if there's one person I want to say to hell with it, let's be together forever to, it's her._

* * *

Jessica Lee Moore was born on January 24, 1985. She was twenty years old. She died on November 2, 2005. She was an only child. Her parents, Mike and Natalie Moore, were struck deeply by the death of their dear daughter. They cried. Castiel felt like crying too, just at the sight of them, mourning their daughter. The pain was raw, rawer than the pain in anyone else's he'd met on cases. It was almost interesting, though that word felt sickening under the circumstances, but still. It was almost interesting to see how many lives Jessica Lee Moore affected. She had several friends, all of which seemed to show up for the funeral.

She was born on the same day as Castiel, just two years later.

Castiel stuck to the side for most of the funeral and, surprisingly, unless someone approached him, so did Balthazar. It was depressing, but what funeral wasn't? He didn't really watch. He felt, again, like he was intruding. This wasn't his friend, his daughter, granddaughter, girlfriend. This was an acquaintance, and hardly that. They had met once.

Jessica Lee Moore was dead.

While everyone milled around at the visitation, awaiting the tribute and the procession, Castiel stared at the floor. He wondered what it would be like if Gabriel was in that casket. He shivered.

* * *

They went back to Bobby's. Balthazar went straight to his room and didn't come out for a long time, except to get food or go to the bathroom or something. Castiel wasn't sure what he was doing in there, but he and Bobby gave him his space.

It was a few days before Castiel actually got to get out of the house.

Bobby could probably tell how cramped and stuck he felt, because he didn't really seem to need anything when he asked Castiel to go out to the store. "Hey, idjit," he said, looking up from his many books that he was always reading. "Get your face outta that damn television and c'mere."

Castiel looked up at him and nodded, standing up from the couch and going to the kitchen, where the older man was sitting at the table, pushing his book aside. "Get me a piece of paper and pen, would you?" he said, and Castiel did as he asked. He started to scribble things down quickly in sloppy handwriting that he could only just barely read. "Go get this from the store for me, would you?"

"Yeah," he said, giving him a thankful look. He was thrilled to be able to have an excuse to get out of the house. Before, he felt too guilty to, felt like he would be abandoning Balthazar when he definitely needed him most. If he came out, looking for Castiel, and Castiel wasn't there, then… then nothing would happen, but what really scared him was that his first response was _Mom would be pissed if I weren't there for him._

Years later. _Two years_ _later_, and he was still thinking about that.

And always, always, always, he told himself: _What she did, she did because she thought it was the right thing._

Well, for once, he decided to say fuck the right thing, and turned on the goddamn TV, and he was sure that Bobby could see this cocktail of conflicting emotions spinning through him: the anger (_fuck my mom for doing what she did to me_), the sadness (_Gabriel could be dead for all I know and I'm just sitting here like a fucking duck_), the submissiveness (_well, Mom was always right, so maybe I should just stay…_), and, most of all, the general _ache_, because fuck, everything was falling apart.

Balthazar was _twenty,_ and he was so, so smart, unbearably smart, and he'd dropped out of college after losing his fucking fiancée. Gabriel was _eighteen._ Eighteen. The number felt so small, even though it was only four below his age. He had been kidnapped, maybe tortured, maybe killed. Eighteen. He was still a teenager, still innocent, still learning about the world. Even though he'd been exposed to hunting so young, that didn't matter. _Eighteen._

He was so stressed out. God, he was so stressed out.

"Go on," Bobby said when he lingered, rolling his eyes. Castiel nodded and fled with the shopping list in his hands, rushing to the Impala. He sat there for a second, looking through the items. It was mostly food and beer. Microwave dinners, chips, some Cokes for when they didn't want beer. A lot of popcorn—likely in hopes that soon Balthazar would come out and Castiel could coax him into watching a movie or something with him to cheer him up.

Eventually, he started driving, away from Bobby's and toward the busier part of Sioux Falls. He pulled into the parking lot of a Wal-Mart and parked, sitting there for a second and just enjoying the music playing in the car. It was Journey. He was beginning to like that kind of music. It reminded him of Gabriel. It was comforting, like Gabriel was back in the passenger's seat again, singing along to the words badly.

But then he looked over at the passenger's seat, and he realized no one was there at all.

He got out, sliding the shopping list into his pocket. The store was busy. People were going about their business, pushing carts to and from the doors. Workers in blue vests were pushing lines of carts into the store so people could grab them with ease and navigate them through all of these aisles. He watched all these average people with all their average problems. He heard a couple arguing, heard a mother telling her daughter _no I just got you a toy last week you can't have another this week,_ a father telling his son that _that's way too girly for you._

All of their stupid, petty, and—in the case of the dad and the son—somewhat infuriating issues were so _simple._ None of them dealt with demons killing their dads. None of them had something supernatural kidnap their little brother. None of them dealt with the same demon that killed their dad coming back to kill their other little brother's girlfriend. None of them hunted monsters. And yet they seemed so unhappy, so unsatisfied, and they didn't even realize how lucky they were.

Castiel felt sick. He wanted out all of the sudden. He wanted to go sit in the Impala and just be there. Just _be._ He didn't want to talk or listen or think.

He scrambled to grab a cart, almost running into an old lady, muttering a lot of "Oh, I'm so sorry's" right after.

The lady didn't care. They went about their business.

He pushed the car through the store, trying not to notice any of the people around him but it was hard not to. It was hard not to envy them, to want to live a life where having to work at three in the morning was the worst problem he had. He wanted to _love_ that life, to value and treasure it and truly understand that he was lucky, that he had nothing really bad to worry about, that things could be worse. Instead, he was Castiel Novak, and he wasn't so sure things could be worse. It was getting to him. The stress was getting to him and he could not think at all, not really, not other than these insane amounts of self-pity and _damn I wish I lived another life._

What woke him up from this was a hand on his shoulder. He nearly jumped out of his shoes, spinning around to look at whoever touched him. What he saw was green eyes staring back at him, searching him, narrowing slightly as they looked at him. Castiel stepped back slightly, because the owner of these bright green eyes was standing alarmingly close.

"Sorry," he said. "Are you Castiel Novak?"

He stared at him for a second, took in more of him than the green eyes. There was something off about him, but he looked perfectly normal. His hair was a light brown that could be argued for dark blonde. He was a little bit taller than Castiel, a couple inches at most, and very handsome. He looked to be in his later twenties, somewhere around twenty-six or twenty-seven.

"Yeah, I'm him," he said, nodding. "Who are you?"

"I'm Dean," he answered. His eyes shifted around the store slightly, like he was watching out for a menacing salesman waggling some very deadly 50% off potato chips or free samples. Then his eyes came back to land on Castiel, watching him closely, silent for a second. It got awkward quickly. Castiel was just about to step away from the stranger and move on with his business when he held his hand out to shake hands with him. "Can I call you Cas?"

He put his hands in Dean, shaking it for a moment. "Yeah, I guess," he said. "I doubt we ever talk to each other again after this, though…" He frowned at the guy slightly. "Do you need something?"

"Yes. Kind of. Look, okay, before this is over, I'm probably going to have scared the piss out of you, but I guess we'll just have to deal with that." He let out a breath, and Castiel was becoming increasingly less comfortable around him, wanting to get away and go about his shopping like he'd never met him, but the guy's hand was raising, and he wasn't sure if it was to hit him or not, so when it just rested on his shoulder, he was very surprised.

"What the—" But suddenly they weren't at the grocery store anymore. They _were,_ and then they _weren't,_ and he felt very disoriented and a little bit dizzy as the world flip-flopped around him. While this sensation was sending him stumbling, trying to get his balance, he didn't really notice that _holy shit, they'd just teleported._ When he finally got to the point where he wasn't about to fall, though, this was his first thought.

The lights were flickering as he opened his mouth to say something, and it was starting to rain outside. He looked down at Dean, away from the flickering and sparking lights. The barn they had teleported into was painted with sigils, none of which he recognized, but all of which were painted in—_blood._ He finally realized what was so off about Dean: there was a power about him, radiating off of him in a way he'd never felt before from any monster he'd ever hunted.

It was, honestly, terrifying.

It hit him all of the sudden what all the signs were pointing to Dean being: _demon._ Immediately, his still-disoriented, frightened brain told him that _this is him, this is the demon that killed your dad and Jess._ He knew that that probably wasn't true, but still, he couldn't get that out of his head, and suddenly he was thinking of this guy slicing his stomach open and throwing him on the ceiling of the barn to be burned. Or would he even waste his time being so dramatic, when there was no one to come into the barn and see it?

"What the hell do you want with me?" was the first thing he said as his eyes roamed around the barn, looking for a way to escape. Dean was blocking his path to the entrance, but maybe if he could distract him, he could get by… It was unlikely (_really, really, really, really unlikely,_ he told himself), but it was his best shot. "And who are you, really?"

Dean sighed in annoyance, though Castiel wasn't really sure why. "I am Dean, an angel of the Lord, and I'm the one who will save you from your fate in perdition," he said, his deep, gruff voice practically echoing through the barn. Lightening struck, illuminating the barn. In the dim light, Castiel could make out the ginormous shadows of two wings extending from Dean's back, but he couldn't see the wings themselves. It was oddly beautiful, even though he couldn't see the feathers. Dean's eyes shone too, no longer an impossible shade of green, but now a blue-white glow. The weirdest part in the whole scheme of weird, entrancing things that happened in the seconds before the lightening flash was gone was that the glow of Dean's eyes was heavenly, not hellish. He knew some powerful demons' eyes were colors other than black, but the color of Dean's eyes seemed _good_ and _pure._

After he got over his shock, Castiel said quietly, "There are no such things as angels."

Dean rolled his eyes and shook his head. "Didn't your father used to say, 'Angels are watching over you'? He was right," he said. "Angels have been watching over you and your brothers since you were born. The three of you are very important, Cas."

"No," he said, refusing to believe it, refusing to let Dean use his dad to his advantage, to make Castiel believe him because of that. "No, you're a demon. That's all you could be. I didn't know demons have wings, but you're a demon."

"Demons do have wings, though they're not like angels'," he told him. "That's not the point. The point is, you need to listen to me and stay calm for a moment while you do, or I will be forced to temporarily paralyze you."

He was already powerless, weaponless, and the most helpless he'd been in a long, long time. The last thing he wanted was for him to become more powerless and helpless, but as much as he wanted to just sit quietly and listen to Dean's story to avoid this fate, he couldn't. He couldn't help it. There were too many questions; too much adrenaline and fear pounding at him like the power he felt coming from Dean, the raw electricity beating away at him by the second. There was so much going on at once that the most coherent thought he came up with was _Fuck, and I thought he was cute._

"All right, just hear me out, and then I will answer your questions," Dean said, seeming to think that Castiel was calm now, that he wasn't going to freak out.

But that was exactly what he did.

"No. _Fuck no._ I don't know what the hell you have against me, but just fucking let me go," he snapped, panicking, looking around for an escape, _damn it he needed an escape_, but there was nothing, no way past Dean. He was trapped, so trapped. He was terrified, he was like a scared little kid, and he had no one to cling to for help, no Gabriel to grin and start talking his way through things, no Mom to pull out the gun she'd always carry and shoot the demon so they could run by.

There was no one. There was nothing. He hadn't been this scared in a long time either.

"All right, Cas," he said, sighing and stepping forward. "I'm sorry that I have to do this." He raised his hand, two fingers extended toward his head. He felt them touch his forehead, and then everything went numb. The only thing he could do was blink and move his tongue around in his mouth. He attempted to move his fingers, but it was like they weren't even there anymore. He tried to open his mouth, tried to say, _Un-paralyze me!_ but nothing worked.

"Now that you can't interrupt me anymore, there are a few things that are pretty necessary for me to explain," he said. "Afterward, I will release your mouth so you can ask questions. The rest of your body will be left paralyzed, as you seem to be too set on finding a plan to claw my eyes out to engage in a real conversation with your body free for you to move."

This was crazy. He was going to die. He was so sure he was going to die.

Dean stepped forward and placed his hands under Castiel's armpits, lifting him up and pulling him over to the wall of the barn. He propped him up there so he could look at Dean as he sat down across from him. His head threatened to loll to the side, so Dean leaned forward and moved it so it couldn't do that in the middle of their talk.

He was so going to die.

"It's been a long time since an angel had this talk with a human," he said with a little sigh. "And I'm not very pleased to be having it with you. Anyway, guardian angels. Surely you've heard of them? Well, they're not real, but there is something similar to 'guardian angels' that is real. And yes, angels are real, blah blah. We don't possess like demons. We have to have consent to enter a body.

"Anyway, it takes quite the… What would it be called? Quite the major friggin' screw-up to be assigned a 'guardian angel,'" Dean said, and Castiel wanted to spit something sarcastic out at him, but he couldn't move. It was the worst feeling of his entire life. "When you are assigned one, you're not actually being assigned an angel to just look at you your whole life. That would be pretty pointless. My grace, which is what makes up an angel—think of it like a soul, but not a soul, far more powerful and advanced and able to exist outside of a body—is bonded to your soul. Grace-and-soul-bonding is a very delicate, ancient concept that has been used for millennia, but despite its age, it's been used very rarely. Not everyone is as big of a screw-up as you, kiddo."

He leaned forward, two fingers extended again, touching Castiel's forehead. He couldn't feel anything still, but he could move his mouth, his lips. He glared at him angrily as he said, "Don't call me '_kiddo_.'"

"Fine. I'll stick to Cas," he said, rolling his eyes slightly. "Did you listen to any of what I said?"

"Yes," he muttered. "Every impossible word of it."

He rolled his eyes. "Cas, I don't know when it's going to act up for you, but now that your soul and my grace are in the presence of each other, you're going to be able to feel what I feel, at least on some level," he said. "Don't be alarmed. It won't be extreme. Maybe if I'm _really_ angry, you'll be able to detect that, or if I'm _really_ hurt. It's developed this way so the angel can sense if the human is in trouble, or, since our grace is more advanced and can take advantage of the bond better, if they are going to soon be in trouble."

"And, let me guess, I'm in trouble or something," he said.

"Yes. That's where the perdition thing comes in," he said.

Castiel had almost forgotten Dean's opening line to this whole world of crazy: _I am Dean, an angel of the Lord, and I'm the one who will save you from your fate in perdition._

"Yeah, can you explain that a bit more?" he said, raising an eyebrow at him.

"No, unfortunately for you I can't," he said, shrugging slightly like it didn't bother him at all that Castiel was left totally in the dark. He was still panicking at being totally at Dean's will, but he was trying not to show this as he sent another glare in the "angel's" direction. "All you may know now about that is that you must be worthy of heaven, Cas."

"That's kind of vague," he said.

"Unfortunately for you," he said.

"Is that your favorite phrase? 'Unfortunately for you'?" he snapped. "Or is it just hilarious to you that I'm totally in the dark about whatever's going on here and you've got me paralyzed and sat up against a stupid fucking barn wall?"

Dean frowned at him slightly, and Castiel could tell he was frowning only to contain an amused smile. "No, there are just a lot of things that are unfortunate for you," he said. After a pause, he added, "Unfortunately for you."

"I'm going to kill you."

"I really don't think you are," he said. "Anyway, do you have something to say or ask that doesn't involve murdering me?"

"Yeah. How do you expect me to believe that angels are real?" he asked. This was something he felt passionately about. He used to believe, even after his dad died. He used to still think that there were angels that maybe just messed up a little bit, and that was how the demon got to his dad and killed him. But it was a mistake, and all mistakes were to be forgiven, so he forgave these mysterious angels that accidentally let his dad die. But as he got older, he realized that there couldn't be angels, couldn't be a heaven, couldn't be a God. The world was too cruel, too harsh, and too many shitty things happened to him for there to be some divine force looking over them.

No, there were only monsters. Only evil. Only demons and Satan himself, looking on as he slowly, slowly, slowly let the world burn.

It hit him suddenly, and out of nowhere he felt _it,_ felt Dean's power grow ten times stronger, and it should have made the rest of the lights in the barn burst with it surging through the air, but it didn't. It should have made the rain pound harder on the barn's roof, but it didn't. And he realized that this was all him. Dean's power hadn't amplified. He just _felt_ it.

With the wave of power that he could now feel like it was a tangible thing, which it almost was, he could suddenly feel the truth behind everything Dean was saying. He could tell Dean was conveying this toward him, making sure Castiel understood that everything he was telling him was all honesty, and it was so real and raw that he believed it. He believed in angels, in heaven, in Dean. He knew Dean didn't want to harm him. He wanted to help him.

"Oh my fuck," he breathed out, because the sensation was worse than when Dean had first flown them there, making him dizzy but he wasn't even standing up, couldn't even move.

"I assume you've started to feel the bond," he said. He leaned forward, touched Castiel's forehead, and suddenly he could move again. He slumped further down against the wall of the barn, hand going to his forehead as he frowned, trying to make sense of all these things in his mind that weren't his. Dean's feelings, his honesty, was already starting to slip away, but the fact that he could feel them at all, could distinguish them from the things that were connected to his own thoughts and mind, freaked him out.

"Yeah, I think so," he said. He was still vaguely scared of Dean, but most of that was gone. Instead there was… _trust._ He trusted Dean, because fuck, he could feel the trustworthiness in him, though it wasn't one of the emotions or anything, like when he'd felt Dean hoping Castiel knew he was being honest. This was different. It was indescribable, just a thing that _was._ Castiel trusted Dean, and that was how things, from then on, would always be.

"I've felt it since the bonding ritual when you were born," he said. "It was dulled considerably, though, until your soul came in contact with my grace today. It's so… weird, isn't it? I've always felt my vessel's presence in my head, but I've never felt another presence in my _mind._ Heads and minds are very distinctly different concepts, I've realized."

"Yeah," he said, hardly listening to Dean as he continued to drone on about how he sometimes felt when Castiel was really, really sad. Like, _I am broken_ sad. After he heard that, he tuned it all out, and just focused on his hands, resting in his lap. Angels were real. He had a guardian angel, someone he trusted so wholeheartedly in a matter of seconds that it was alarming. How could he go around with a constant feeling of _Where's Dean? Is Dean okay? Oh, shit, Dean's upset. Dean's really upset. I wonder if Dean's okay._ Was that how things were going to be? He hoped not. He really hoped that if this ritual thing did anything to him, it wasn't going to make him _clingy_ to a guy he did not like. Yeah, he was cute, but… Castiel didn't really know what it was that just made him think, _No. No way. No way at all._

"Cas? Are you listening? Hey, Cas," he said. Dean was standing up. Castiel looked up at him and stood up too. "Do you want to go back to your shopping now?"

"Yes," he said quickly. "I kind of just want to forget this entirely. Can you, like, not show up unless you need to save me from something?"

Dean shook his head. "I'm going to check up on you regularly," he said. "It's my job, now that you're setting yourself in a path of danger."

"I don't even know what path of danger I'm setting myself into, so I think I'm good on that front, buddy," he said. "I don't really need my guardian angel hanging over me all the time. And I really don't want to deal with Bobby and Balthazar's reactions."

"You're going to have to tell them," he said. "I'm not going to adjust my schedule to check up on you on yours, so they're going to find out eventually. Tell them now so _I _don't have to deal with it later."

"It's like we're secret lovers or something," he said, rolling his eyes. This was all still crazy, but it helped if he was sarcastic about it.

Dean stared blankly at him for a second at this comment before shaking his head. "While we're bonded, we may as well help each other," he said. "I figured I could help you in your search for Gabriel, and you can help me better understand humanity. I know quite a bit more than I used to, but I'm still far behind."

"I can kind of tell," he said. A smile was tugging at his lips now, because with a fucking _angel of the Lord_ on his side, there was no way he couldn't find Gabriel. "But thanks. Yeah, I'll help you if you help me. That would be really, really great."

"All right, so it's settled," he said, nodding.

"Hey, can you help me with one more thing?" Castiel asked, because even though it was apparent that Dean didn't want to be dragged into the affairs of Balthazar and Bobby, he really wasn't sure how he was going to convince him. He may as well have started with Balthazar though.

"It depends," he said.

"Can you help me tell Balthazar?" he asked. "Maybe we can just go to a diner with him and you show him your eyes or something. That should probably convince him."

He frowned slightly. "I already told you, I don't want to be involved in that," he said. "Find a way to tell him yourself."

"Oh, come on, Dean," he said, rolling his eyes. "Just help me."

He stared at him for a second, before rolling his green eyes. "Fine, I suppose," he said.

"Thanks," he said. "I think I know a place we can go to tell him. Do you like pie?"


	5. Chapter 5

**So yeah. This. Uh. I hope you like it, and review and stuff, and thank you to everyone that has read and reviewed and all of that so far.**

**Also, random note: I'm like 507% sure that "unknowingness" isn't an actual word but Microsoft counted it as one and it was perfect for the description I was writing so fucking it's there. Enjoy it. Fucking treasure the fucking unknowingness. **

* * *

_"I think I know a place we can go to tell him. Do you like pie?"_

* * *

Castiel insisted that they drive to Bobby's, though his refusal to leave the Impala behind at the grocery store confused Dean. "Does Bobby not have a lot of extra cars?" he asked, to which Casitel rolled his eyes. "What? What is so special about this car? It's very impractical, isn't it? And the doors are so loud. What if you need to be inconspicuous but your doors give it away?"

"You respect Baby," he said, giving him a look as he turned the key in the ignition, starting to drive out of the parking lot. "And deal with one car ride without complaining, will you? Bobby's isn't far from here."

"It's so confining," Dean muttered, looking around the interior of the car with a displeased look on his face. He shifted in the seat uncomfortably, fiddling with the seatbelt that Castiel insisted he didn't need to wear, but he put it on anyway. "And it makes my wings feel tight. I don't like it."

"Yeah, about your wings," he said. "Can I ask why I can't see them? And why you can be in this little car with those giant wings? And how you can, like, fit through doors?"

Dean looked over at him. "Like my true form, my wings exist on a different plain than that of doors, your car, and your eyes," he said. "They pass through things easily when need be. Right now, I have them folded, but they're smashed against the seat."

"Can't they just go through the seat?" Castiel asked, looking over at him and trying to imagine a gigantic pair of wings folded up on Dean's back. He couldn't. All he could see was the green shirt Dean was wearing. Beyond that, there was only car seat. Maybe his imagination wasn't very good.

"It's complicated," was Dean's response, and he said it in a way that obviously implied that it was _too complicated for Castiel,_ which annoyed him to no end. "I don't feel like explaining it now. Maybe another time?"

"Yeah," he said, still not used to the idea that this angel was going to be checking in on him often that they probably could make time to educate Castiel in Angel Physiology 101. He stopped abruptly, almost running into a car stopped at the red light, and Dean suddenly looked so terrified that they were going to crash into the car in front of them that Castiel had to laugh. While Dean's wide, fearful eyes searched around frantically, as though unsure if Castiel was alive or not, he laughed, loud and clear and joyful, happy for maybe the first time since Gabriel disappeared.

Dean's fear soon dissipated, and he looked over at Castiel with a little bit of a frown. "What are you laughing at?" he asked, confused and still a little afraid now that they'd started driving again. "I thought you were going to die. I thought for sure I was going to fail."

Castiel was still smiling gleefully and he shook his head slightly. "You were so scared," he said. "It was kind of… _cute._ Funny-cute."

"I am not 'cute,'" he muttered, rolling his eyes. He no longer seemed overly relieved that Castiel was alive, and a bit more like he wanted strangle Castiel. That was better. He didn't like it when Dean was looking at him like that, so happy that he was okay, so happy that he was alive. It was disconcerting, like Dean was awed by him. There was no reason for someone like Dean, an angel, and probably a pretty important one, to be awed by Castiel. He was nothing.

"You are," he said, looking over at him, the smile dropped from his face but not entirely gone from his eyes. "You are, like, way adorable."

"I am not up to date in modern conventions, Cas, but I don't think that that was a sentence that you should ever say again," he said. "It seems like one that may easily evoke embarrassment in everyone who hears it."

"Are you saying you're embarrassed by me calling you way adorable?" he asked. Of course he didn't find him _actually_ way adorable or cute. He was a funny-cute, a clueless-cute, and of course, he was no less hot than he'd been when Castiel had first seen him, but he wasn't attracted to him. Something about the fact that he kidnapped him and took him to some random barn to paralyze him and scare the crap out of him was a bit of a turnoff.

Dean didn't respond to Castiel, probably put off by his lack of ability to think of a comeback. Castiel knew he was blushing but he didn't look over at him. He didn't want to. It was weird. He didn't even think angels would be able to blush, and he definitely didn't want the angel that was supposed to look over him and protect him from who knew what to be blushing because of him.

They got to Bobby's a few minutes later, and Castiel wasn't sure what he was going to say about Dean. He would probably have him fly them to the café to have pie, because he didn't want to explain him to Balthazar on the ride over in the car. He knew Dean would probably gloat about Castiel leaving the car behind. It was one of those things that he just _knew,_ because of the bond. As much as he didn't want to deal with giving Dean that satisfaction, having him fly them there was the easiest option for everyone. Well, except Balthazar. Balthazar would have to suck it up, really.

"Fly us up to his bedroom," Castiel requested, looking over at him. "Please."

He nodded and put his hand on Castiel's shoulder, and there were in the Impala and then they weren't, in less than a blink of an eye. It wasn't like everything blurred from one thing to another. It was so _weird_ because there was the Impala's windshield, and then there was Balthazar. It was just as disorienting as it had been before, and he stumbled around dizzily for a second while Balthazar shouted out and fumbled for the holy water at his bedside.

He didn't have holy water at his bedside before Jess.

"Who the fuck are you?" he snapped, splashing the holy water at both of them. Castiel rolled his eyes but Dean just went on like nothing had just been thrown at him. "Oh, fuck, Cassie, what is this thing?"

"He's an angel," he said, looking up at Dean, who was looking around the room idly, uninterested in the conversation. "Dean, can you do the thing for Balthazar?"

"The wing thing?" he asked, looking over at him. Castiel realized how _weird_ it was that they had already started talking like they were old friends. They had an understanding of each other like old friends already. There was no reason not to trust Dean. There was no reason they shouldn't talk like old friends. They could feel each other's presence, each other's emotions. Dean was very bored, though he didn't need the bond to know that. He should have been freaked out. He should have thought it was too weird.

But… it wasn't. It felt… natural.

"Yeah, the wing thing," Castiel said. He wondered how badly Balthazar was freaking out. From the looks of his face, pretty badly.

"It's too cramped in here," he said, shaking his head. "I can do the eye thing though."

"Yeah, do the eye thing," he said.

This was crazy. This needed to stop. But he didn't want it to. This angel was going to help him find Gabriel. This angel was going to look out for him. He, Balthazar, and Gabriel would have a pretty easy shot at staying alive as long as Dean was Castiel's "guardian angel." He hoped he never stopped being valuable to the angels. He could put up with Dean for his entire life if it meant life security for those that he loved too.

Because he'd kill Dean if he let one of his brothers or Bobby die. He would, no doubt, no hesitation, kill him.

"Castiel," Balthazar breathed, terrified. He motioned for him to get away from Dean. He looked over and saw that his eyes were glowing blue-white, and though he did look alarmingly intimidating like that, he could still feel the outstanding amount of boredom coming from him. He knew he wouldn't be able to feel it if it wasn't so strong. Dean wanted to do something. He didn't really care about Balthazar. Well, that was definitely going to have to change if they were going to work together.

"It's okay," he reassured him. He stepped closer to Dean. "He's fine. He's on our side. And he's an angel. Come on, let's get pie. Dean's flying."

"You're leaving the car behind?" Dean asked, raising an eyebrow slightly.

He rolled his eyes. "Yeah, it's easier that way," he said.

He grinned a little bit. "So you admit, flying is more convenient," he said.

"Shut up. No. The car's best. I want you to fly us just this once," he told him.

"All right," he said, unconvinced.

"I'm not going anywhere with it," he snapped, finally stepping forward and grabbing Castiel's arm. He yanked him away from Dean roughly. He stumbled before regaining his balance and frowning at him. "That's a demon, Castiel. You brought home a fucking _demon._"

"Holy water didn't work," he said, looking at him.

"So? That's not an angel. Angels are good. I'd know if it were an angel," he said.

He frowned more at him. "Why? Because you still pray? Because you still believe what Dad used to say?" he asked. "Balthy, that doesn't exactly mean you can classify what is and isn't an angel."

He turned and faced him. "You can't honestly think you can march your happy ass in here with this pretty boy and expect me to believe you've just up and found a goddamn angel," he snapped at him. "No, Castiel, I don't believe that shit Dad said. I hardly fucking remember it. I don't believe in fucking angels or God anymore because what the fuck kind of God would let Jess _burn_ on the fucking ceiling?"

"My father," Dean spoke up, turning his back to green eyes on Castiel's little brother with fury building up in them, "is a good God. You are lucky to have one such as him. You will _not_ speak unkindly about him in my presence."

"Dude, whatever the hell you are, stop fucking playing and feeding me bullshit," Balthazar said, glaring back at Dean.

Before Castiel knew what was happening, Dean had flown right in front of his brother, pushing him to the wall in a swift motion and pressing his arm into his throat, pinning him there against the wall. He was a couple inches taller than Balthazar too, but even if he was 5'2, the look that he fixed on his brother would have done enough to scare the literal piss out of him if he were in Balthazar's spot. He was practically quaking with fury. Castiel could feel that powerful sensation around the room again, and he shivered with the force of it. Apparently Dean radiated more of it when he was angry.

"I could kill you right now, with just a little pressure," he said quietly, his voice low but not so low that Castiel couldn't hear. He thought that Dean wanted him to hear, wanted him to get the same speech as Balthazar but not having had any reason to give it yet. "You are weak and frail, _human._" More chills crept down his spine at the pure, untouched _anger_ that came from the way the angel said "human." He was like a ball of fury, of power, and Castiel believe him wholeheartedly when he said: "I will not tolerate anymore talk like that about my father. Do you understand?"

Balthazar nodded slightly, fear in his eyes, so strong that Castiel was sure it would be drowning him as much as Dean's anger was if they had the bond that he and Dean had.

"Get off of him!" Castiel finally shouted, finding his voice. In all honesty, he was terrified of Dean in that moment too, and he decided that he could not totally give his full trust to Dean, not until he proved he deserved it, and he didn't really seem to deserve it then after threatening to kill his brother. "You don't touch him, Dean! You _do not_ touch him!"

He reluctantly stepped away from Balthazar after a moment of consideration. He turned his gaze to Castiel slowly. It was still hostile and Castiel was still scared, but he stepped forward and put himself between Balthazar and Dean, facing Dean while Balthazar pressed himself against the wall.

"If you _ever_ touch him again, I won't hesitate to end _you,_ Dean," he said. "I won't tolerate any of that manhandling bull."

"I suppose we're at an agreement, then," he said, his gaze softening slightly. It was still fierce, but most of the anger had been turned into respect for Castiel, that vague _awe_ that he didn't really understand coming from Dean. "No talking like that about my father and no manhandling."

"Good," he said, and now that that was settled, they all sat in an awkward silence, Balthazar stepping out from behind Dean. He was still obviously scared that Dean might attack him again, but he wasn't one to cower behind his big brother. He looked over at the younger Novak and said, "Okay, listen, I swear we can trust this guy. He'll explain it over pie and there will no arguing, okay? And no badmouthing God or manhandling Balthazar. Got it, you two?"

It was like he was their mother or something.

"I really don't want to—" Balthazar started, but before he could finish, Dean had his hands on both of their shoulders and he flew them to a café. He apparently didn't yet understand that most people don't understand when three people randomly appear in the middle of a little restaurant, because he flew them right into a booth, not taking them to outside so they were less conspicuous.

And he was trying to talk to him about his car doors being impractical.

He was less dizzy when they landed this time, maybe because they landed sitting down, but Balthazar was practically spinning on his side of the booth—Dean had landed them so he and Castiel were sitting next to each other, probably because he felt more comfortable with Castiel. He grabbed his forehead and groaned. "Fuck, man, headache," he said. "And what the hell was that?"

"Flight," he said. "It gets better, I think." He looked up at Dean. "You brought us to the middle of the freaking diner. Next time fly us to outside so no one notices us randomly popping up in the middle of the café, okay?"

"No one noticed," he said. "But fine, if you insist."

"Thanks."

"You're fucking _crazy,_ Castiel," Balthazar snapped as he slowly gained control of himself again. "You're fucking talking to this fucking 'angel' like he's been our buddy for years and it's totally normal that he wants to fly us around and shit."

"I believe you were waiting for an explanation," Dean said, looking across the table at him with a so-done expression. No, the best word for it was a total _bitchface._ "So why don't you wait for your explanation before you complain about the plausibility of my existence?"

Balthazar stared at him for a second and then looked at Castiel, waiting for him to back his little brother up, but he was smiling slightly at Dean. He was very amusing, and his bitchface was the best bitchface he'd ever seen given, and Bobby could give some fucking great bitchfaces. Everything about Dean was _different_ and some things were better than others and some things were worse, and ultimately, he was the most original thing he'd ever seen. Even the weird monsters that Castiel was sure Eve was drunk when she made them were normal compared to this being, this force of power.

"All right, fine, then give me the damn explanation," his brother finally snapped at Dean, after realizing that Castiel wasn't going to say anything to him. He looked disappointed that he had chosen this angel over his little brother.

Dean explained, quickly, everything he had told Castiel: all about the grace-and-soul-bond and his angelic…_ness_ and he ventured a bit more into the angel troubles than he had when he talked to Castiel, saying something about people fighting over the fact that Dean hadn't come down to assist Castiel yet, though he insisted that he was fine for a while, until recently he felt a huge fuckup in the works for him, so he came down earlier than expected.

Balthazar, naturally, was skeptical, but Castiel nodded earnestly every time the younger Novak looked at him for confirmation. His growing frown was a sign of his confusion, either at how they could possibly think of such an elaborate story or at how they could've missed the existence of angels and Castiel's "_guardian angel_" their entire lives. He hoped it was the latter, because everything would be so much easier if he believed them and they were all on the same page.

Fortunately, he did, and of course he weakly tried to joke about it, though the joke sounded kind of pathetic coming out of his mouth, as he was still confused and trying too hard to think all of it through. He stuttered out, "So… are you two, like, boyfriends now or something?"

"How did you get that out of my explanation?" Dean asked, frowning at Balthazar.

"No, we're not together," Castiel said, rolling his eyes at him. "That's ridiculous."

"Well, hey, all that bondy shit sounded like love-at-first-sight or something like that," he said, shrugging. He looked through the menu, trying to seem casual, but when he glanced up at Dean there was a bit of uncertainty and distrust in his eyes. He wasn't totally used to the idea of everything they'd told him about, and Castiel didn't blame him. He would give his brother time to adjust and learn to trust Dean.

"No way," he said, rolling his eyes. He knew what he wanted: pie. So he didn't flip through the menu, but instead looked up at the angel. "Have you ever had pie before?"

"No," he answered, looking down at him. "I haven't had the need to. I don't need to eat and so pie has never interested me."

"Oh, you have led a poor, unfulfilling life if you've never had pie," he said, shaking his head. "You're getting some. I'll order it for you."

"That's not necessary, Cas," he said, raising an eyebrow at him, confused at his insistence on trying something that was, to him, pointless.

"Hang on," Balthazar said, looking up between them from his menu. "'_Cas_'? Where did that come from?"

"He likes it more than Castiel or Cassie," Castiel explained, shrugging slightly and looking at his little brother, whose eyebrows were raised. It was like he was offended that Dean got to give Castiel a nickname, though he didn't understand why. He knew that it was probably weird for this angel to be thrust at him without the bond to rely on, but honestly, he shouldn't have been flipping out about it more than Castiel was, and Castiel definitely was. He was just trying not to show it. There was a freaking _angel of the Lord_ sitting next to him about to eat pie with him who understood him so completely because of a spell that he knew ahead of time if he was about to put himself into deep shit.

Balthazar stared between them for a second. "Okay, I'm done, I'm not nodding along to this shit anymore," he said. "I don't want to, but Castiel does so I believe you, Dean. But how the fuck are you not freaking out?" He addressed this to Castiel.

He tried to find a better way to word it than _It just _is,but it was one of the things that just _was._ So many things with Dean just inexplicably _were._ They came to be, forced their roots down into you, and sat there, growing and becoming. Everything about Dean was like that, actually. Everything he knew about the angel had forced its way into him within the last hour or so that he had known him, and maybe it would freak him out later, when he didn't have the bond to feel and rely on to assure him that he wasn't crazy, but until then, he was satisfied with things just _being._ He was satisfied with, for the first time in a while, feeling safe and happy and like everything could turn out okay in the long run, and anything that could make him feel like that was more than welcomed.

"I don't know," he said. "I think it's the bond thing. It's making me… I don't know, okay with all that. I don't know if I'm going to flip out when Dean leaves or not, but it's kind of nice to be relaxed for once so I'm just going to roll with it for now."

"You'll get used to it," Dean promised him. "And then you will return to your usual self around me. Until then, yes, you will feel more at peace around me than anyone else. I've heard this is the natural response. I'm feeling it too."

Balthazar stared between them for another second before just shaking his head and looking down at his menu, his bitchface emerging. It wasn't as strong as Dean's, but it was still bitchy as fuck.

"Maybe this'll make you feel better," Castiel said. "He's going to help us look for Gabe, and all we have to do in return is help him understand humanity better because he's kind of a newbie to all of our… er… customs, I guess."

"Mostly your mannerisms and the way you speak," he said. "I don't understand half the references you make and I don't understand what certain gestures and actions means. Like this." He then flipped both of them off, and they raised their eyebrows before Castiel's surprise dissolved into amusement. "I've seen many humans doing this, and whoever they do it to seems either offended or entertained, but I don't know what it means."

"It means 'fuck you,' basically, Dean," he told him, grinning slightly. "Put your fucking fingers down, dude."

Dean did, staring at his hands in confusion. "How are fingers considered to be the equivalent of telling someone to fuck themselves?"

"Yeah, man, you need to work on your humanness," he said, still amused by him. He shook his head slightly. "We'll get there."

The waitress came over and took their orders. Balthazar got some generic rabbit food thing, and Castiel ordered himself and Dean Pecan pie, which was his favorite. The waitress nodded and went off.

"So," Balthazar said. "_Gabriel._ He's going to help us find him?"

"Yes," Dean said. "I am. It shouldn't take long. I might be able to find him by the end of the day, if it's an average capturing. He could be changed into a vampire or werewolf by this time, but I assume you'd prefer him that way than to being dead."

"Yes," Castiel said, nodding. "But hopefully he's not a vampire or a werewolf."

"Yes, hopefully," he said. "Hopefully, also, he isn't dead."

Balthazar and Castiel fell silent, neither of them finding something to say to that. Neither of them wanted to think of that right then, though they had thought of it plenty before. Truthfully, they were terrified that this was even an option, but as the days wore on, it became more and more plausible. Castiel looked over and he could see the pain glittering in his brother's eyes. He knew he couldn't bear losing Jess and Gabe in such quick succession. No, he would make sure that it was not an option for Gabriel to be dead. For Gabriel, whose life had too far to go before it was over, and for Balthazar, whose sadness he wouldn't allow to take over his life.

For his mother, who would have killed him for letting Gabriel die.

For Bobby, who treated them as children, whose mourning would be equal to a parent who lost his child.

And for himself, because he could not live with himself if he allowed Gabriel to die on his watch.

For so many people. Gabriel touched so many people, and it was up to Castiel to make sure that he continued touching those people, those people that desperately needed him in their lives.

"Cas," Dean said quietly, looking over at him with concern written all across his face. He realized that this strong feeling must have been passing strongly through their bond. He felt Dean's hand touch his shoulder and he relaxed slightly, the pain of thinking about losing his little brother dulling slightly into the same soft ache he'd felt constantly since his disappearance. "It's okay. We'll find him."

He nodded, wishing he hadn't needed Dean to do that for him, wishing he wasn't so weak that he was falling apart right in front of them, in the middle of the little diner, wishing he wasn't so reliant on this random angel's comforts, wishing he wasn't so… so _pathetic._ He felt this start to overwhelm him too, and he tried to push it down, tried to get it so Dean didn't feel it, but he couldn't. He couldn't control it. It washed through him faster when he realized he was powerless against this too, and Dean's concern amplified.

"Cas," he repeated, a bit more forcefully. His grip on his shoulder tightened, but it didn't hurt. "Are you okay? Please don't be upset. We'll find Gabriel, I promise you, and if he does happen to be dead, I will do everything in my power to bring him back. I don't ask for anything in return, because in the end, this will be the least I could do for you. Just… don't… be upset. I don't know how to deal with upset."

Balthazar's face was full of worry too as he listened and watched Dean talk to Castiel. "Cassie, you okay?" he asked softly. "It's going to be okay, you know."

"I know," he said. It shouldn't be his job to tell him that. "I'm fine. I'm just… I'm just a bit stressed, you know, with Gabe and all of the other… just other _crap._"

"Yeah," he said. God, Balthazar was the one that had lost his girlfriend recently. It wasn't up to him to make sure that Castiel was okay, that he wasn't hurting, but it was so undeniably _selfless_ and caring that he couldn't help but make sure, and he swelled with pride while at the same time deflating because he couldn't be that way.

The waitress came back with their food, and he pulled it together because fucking _pie._ Pie made everything better.

"This is pie," Dean said when he got it, looking down at it. Castiel nodded. "What are those things?"

"Pecans," he told him, smiling slightly. "Come on, try it."

"I don't taste like humans do," he told him, looking over at him. "Everything is… _moleculy._"

"'Moleculy'? Like… tastes like… molecules?" Dean nodded to Castiel. "What do molecules taste like?"

"Molecules," Dean explained. He picked up his fork and poked at the pie with a little frown. This fucking badass scary-as-hell angel was acting like a five-year-old about trying something new and it was about the best thing he'd ever seen. His spirits were lifted considerably, and so were Balthazar's, as they watched him dig his first bite away from the rest of the slice and put it in front of his mouth. He opened it, and went to put the pie in his mouth, but chickened out at the last second. "I don't see the point of this, Cas."

Balthazar grinned. "Just eat it," he said. His qualms about the angel seemed to have died, and now he was joining in with Castiel in the amusement of the cluelessness and the unknowingness of Dean. "C'mon, you're acting like a little kid."

Dean looked up at him with a little glare. It wasn't an angry one, but more defiant, and the comment from Balthazar was enough to eat the bite of pie just to prove that he wasn't acting like a little kid. He let it sit there for a second, maybe tasting it, before chewing and swallowing. He looked up at the two of them, amazement evident in the look in his eyes and on his face. "Oh," he said quietly, slowly. "_Pie._"

"Pie," Castiel agreed with a nod, while Balthazar laughed at Dean's reaction and ate his food. Castiel relived the moment for a second—the shock on his face when he said "Oh, pie"  
was priceless—and he ended up laughing too. He took a bite of his pie, and it was exceptionally good. That was why he wanted to go to this diner: he knew they had damn good pie.

"I can taste the pecans and the pie and the—ooh, I like this," he said after taking another bite, his face full of bliss as he smiled. He had a warm, easy smile when it actually came out. Castiel would offer the rest of the world's supply of pecan pie to see that smile over and over again. This thought didn't last for long, because if it would have, he would have been freaked out by it, but as it was it came and went, fleeting but wonderful and making the ache in his chest over Gabriel dull even more.

He reminded himself slowly as he watched his brother laugh and Dean smile that things would be okay.


	6. Chapter 6

**Twist and Shout reference ahead! For those of you who haven't read Twist and Shout, seriously go read it. It is my favorite fanfic, Destiel or not. It's on Archive of Our Own and _seriously just go read it. _I don't care if you only read on fanfiction. Just do it. It's amazing. **

**Anyway, this takes place during the Bloody Mary episode and it's a lot like the episode. Like pretty much almost exactly. So I skipped over a lot. **

**Also, when the angels John and Mary are mentioned, that's actually technically John and Mary Winchester. Since Raphael and Rachel are humans, John and Mary are angels.**

* * *

_He reminded himself slowly as he watched his brother laugh and Dean smile that things would be okay._

* * *

Things did start to look up. Dean said he was getting more and more leads on Gabriel, and eventually Bobby decided that Dean wasn't going to kill all of them. He started to come over regularly, to give updates, to make sure things were going all right, that Castiel hadn't seriously damaged anything to do with this grand master "plan" the angels had going on for him. He was vaguely getting the hang of humanity. He said a lot of the time when he wasn't with Castiel, he was out observing humans, trying to understand them. He was the most interesting thing in the list of interesting things happening to them. He was the only thing they had going on that Castiel didn't want to be resolved. He wanted Gabriel back, he wanted whatever he had to do with the angels to be over with, but he didn't want Dean to leave.

He even went on a hunt with them, one which he was very annoyed with, but Castiel insisted that he wasn't going to help Dean with his angelic problems until he helped them with their hunter problems, so Dean sat in the back seat while Balthazar and Castiel turned up some music and sang badly along to it. Both of them badly wanted to be out with Dean looking for more on Gabriel, but the angel insisted that he could only search for him where he suspected the youngest Novak was if he had permission from some of the angels that knew the full extent of their plan involving the three brothers. This brought up a lot of questions, most shot down by Dean, but in the end they really had no choice to agree. He did seem apologetic when he told the two of them this. He seemed to care about whether or not they found their younger brother.

"What is this music?" Dean asked from the backseat on the way to the case.

"Elvis!" Balthazar looked back at him and smiled. "_Return to sender,_" he sang, trying to imitate Elvis's voice by lowering his own. "_Address unknown…_"

Dean thought for a second. Castiel could feel his strong confusion and knew he was learning something new from this music or maybe the way they sang along to it. "I can dig Elvis," he said finally, smiling like he was proud of himself for finding the words for this, though they were completely not right. The brothers glanced at each other and started laughing, which made the confusion in Dean's mind grow stronger. "What? Is that not what you say about things you like?"

"No, man, that's from, like, the fifties or sixties or something," Castiel told him, smiling into the mirror at his befuddled expression. They met eyes and stayed like that for a second too long, and then two seconds too long, and then three, and neither of them really knew what they were doing while they were doing it. When they finally jerked their eyes away, it was because Castiel almost missed the turn they needed to go on. "But yeah, Elvis's great…"

Balthazar looked between them curiously, but Castiel shut this look out of his mind.

"I have to go," Dean said suddenly. "I'm being called. I think it's about my request to search for your brother." He disappeared with no other warning, typical Dean style. Castiel felt his absence.

"So," Balthazar said, looking over at him. "We're alone."

He nodded, looking out at the road. "So, what's this case anyway?" he asked.

"I dunno," Balthazar said. He yawned slightly.

Since everyone else's spirits had been lightened considerably, sometimes Castiel forgot that Balthazar had just recently lost his girlfriend and wasn't okay like he, Bobby, and Dean were. He forgot that maybe Balthazar was really tired and maybe he could use some extra rest. He forgot that he was having nightmares about Jess, the same nightmares Castiel sometimes still had about their dad but with his _girlfriend._ He felt horrible for not taking notice of this earlier than he did.

"Hey, you should get some sleep," Castiel said, glancing at his brother. "It's still a bit before we get to Toledo, right?"

"Yeah, like, ten more hours," he said, looking down at the map that was sitting in his lap. "I don't know why Dean couldn't have just flown us."

"Because flying gives me headaches still and I love my car," he said. "Now, sleep. I'll wake you up next time I stop at a gas station."

Balthazar was hesitant, but he finally coaxed him into balling Castiel's jacket up into a pillow and going to sleep. He turned the music down and listened to Elvis's voice rumble quietly through the Impala. The drive would be boring, but he was used to these kinds of road trips, and had been since he was very young. He tried to get his mind off the silence that was deafening him only twenty minutes after Balthazar's eyes were closed, and his mind drifted to Dean.

_I can dig Elvis._ He smiled at the memory. That was what that would always be; no matter what happened, as long as Dean didn't betray them. It would be a fond memory, one of the ones that you smile at when you're gray and sitting on the porch of your old-people home. A lot of things about Dean were fond memories, like the way he couldn't wrap his head around the idea of driving around in cars all the time. He just didn't _get it._ They were too confining to him, too slow, and he was so confused. But Castiel was pretty sure he secretly liked the Impala.

If things went well with the angels that Dean had been called by, they were going to find Gabriel soon too. Everything was going to be okay. Everything was going to be _good._ They had a nice little family built, and though they all had a lot of problems, it was still nice. He wondered what Gabriel would think of Dean. Castiel was sure he'd like him.

He hoped his brother was okay. More than anything else he felt—more than the worry he felt for Balthazar, the fondness he felt for Dean, the apprehension he felt toward whatever plan the angels had going for him—he was _scared._ He was scared that he was going to find him dead. He was scared that his little brother would be gone forever. He was scared that the world they lived in right then might secretly be a world devoid of Gabriel Novak. That was not a world Castiel wanted to live in once he knew that he was truly dead.

A few hours later, he pulled into a gas station. He knew Balthazar would probably be mad if he wasn't woken up, but he needed the sleep. He filled the car up and got himself water before driving off again. The noises seemed to stir his brother a little, because he didn't seem to be in as deep a sleep as he was before. He started to move and shift and he was muttering quietly, face twisted. Castiel realized what was going on.

"Balthazar, wake up," he said loudly, at least loud enough to get him up.

His eyes opened and he frowns in confusion, sitting up straight. The jacket had already fallen from his place and he took it out of his lap, throwing it over into Castiel's.

"I take it I was having a nightmare," he said quietly as realization struck his face.

Castiel nodded. "Yeah, another one."

"Hey, at least I got some sleep."

He looked over at him with a sigh and shook his head. "You know, sooner or later we're gonna have to talk about this," he said. He knew that Balthazar probably wanted to talk sooner, knew that it was probably his fault they hadn't had a one-on-one about Jessica yet, but he'd been so distracted. He didn't want to admit that it may have been his fault his brother was suffering in silence, and as selfish as it made him, he decided to not apologize or admit to this.

Balthazar was quiet, looking out the window at the town passing by them. They stopped at a red light and his eyes fixated on a restaurant. The name of it was _Jess's._

"Did we already go to a gas station?" he asked quietly, looking back at his brother.

"Yeah. Sorry for not waking you up."

"It's fine."

* * *

When they reached Toledo, Balthazar tossed him a newspaper with someone's name on the obituary circled. He looked down at it. "Steven Shoemaker," he repeated. He looked up at Balthazar. "Where are we going first?"

"The morgue, dipshit," he said, rolling his eyes.

Castiel rolled his eyes back and threw the newspaper at him, pulling away from the diner they'd eaten breakfast at. They drove to the hospital. They agreed on the way that they were medical students. Though they had nothing against lying about what they were, it wasn't technically a lie in Balthazar's case. He still was a medical student. He'd only left school a week or so ago.

Jessica had only died a week or so ago. Why did that thought have to accompany any thought of Stanford?

They found their way to the morgue together. Castiel looked around the hospital as they did. Their mom had taught them how to care for themselves if they ever got hurt, but still, hospitals were not new environments to him. They were depressing. They reminded him of death, which of course was natural, but death reminded him of bad things and of bad times, the times when he would curl up and cry and feel weak for doing so.

They walk into a room with two desks. One had a nameplate that read _Dr. D. Feiklowicz_ and at the other one sat the morgue technician. Castiel approached him and smiled slightly.

"Hey," the technician said disinterestedly, looking up at them.

"Hey," Castiel replied.

"Can I help you?" he asked. He radiated _dickhead dickhead dickhead_ and Castiel immediately hated him.

"Yeah," he said, pushing away his irritation at the guy for now because they were on a case and a case meant business and he couldn't get angry at someone helping him on a case. "We're the, uh, med students."

"Sorry?" he said, smiling slightly and smugly, and immediately everything about him seemed irritating to Castiel. His stupid baldness and overly bushy eyebrows. There was no confusion on his face, even though he was clearly confused from his tone. He just seemed smug, with his stupid smug smile.

"Oh, Dr…" He paused. That stupid name. "Fi-Feik-Figlavitch didn't tell you? We talked to him on the phone. He, uh… We're from Ohio State, you know. Yeah." He was having trouble thinking of a lie, stuck on that smug smile still playing across the guy's smug face. He knew that they weren't getting into the morgue and he was entertained that Castiel was even trying. "He's supposed to show us the Shoemaker corpse," he finally said. "It's for our paper."

"Well, I'm sorry, he's at lunch," he said, nodding a little bit.

"Oh," he said, glancing at Balthazar for help, "well he said, uh— Oh, well, y'know, doesn't matter. You don't mind showing us the body, do you?" He tried to give him a little smile back, tried to seem unfazed by the doctor being at lunch and stumbling over the name and that goddamn _smirk_ that was still on the guy's face. Maybe he was just overreacting. Maybe that guy just reminded him of something that pissed him off. Maybe _something._ But if any of the maybes were true, he still didn't care. He didn't like the guy.

"Sorry, I can't," he said, finally letting the smile drop away. "Doc'll be back in an hour. You can wait for him, if you want," and he could tell that this morgue technician knew perfectly well that they didn't want to nor would they wait for the doctor.

"An hour?" he said. "Ooh. I don't think that's going to work. We've gotta be heading back to Columbus by then." He looked to Balthazar again.

"Yeah," Balthazar said with a nod, looking back at him.

"Uh, look, man, this paper's like half our grade, so if you don't mind helping us out—"

The guy cut him off. "Uh, look, man," he said, imitating Castiel, and he smiled, assuming that the guy was going to say yes. But he said: "No," and the smile dropped off of Castiel's face.

He turned to Balthazar. "You deal with this," he said. "Please."

Balthazar rolled his eyes and pulled out his wallet. He placed about a hundred dollars on the guy's desk and he smiled. "Follow me," the technician said, standing up as he took the money. He led them back to the bodies and over to Steven Shoemaker's. He sat next to it as it donned on Castiel that the money Balthazar bribed him with was the money he won at a poker game.

"Hey, wait, man, that was my money," he said, grabbing Balthazar's arm lightly.

He looked at him and rolled his eyes. "Yeah it was. You'll get more," he said.

He puffed out a breath and stood next to the victim's body, irritation growing.

"The newspaper said his daughter found him," Balthazar said, looking at the technician. "She said his eyes were bleeding."

He pulled the sheet back from over the victim's face. "More than that. They were practically liquefied," he said, and it did look that way. Where his eyes should've been, especially in the light of the room, appeared to just be eerie black holes. Castiel frowned down at them, not sure what could do that to a person. He had never encountered anything like it before. Maybe his mom had. He would have to dig her journal out of the Impala's trunk and see.

"Any sign of a struggle?" Castiel asked. "Maybe somebody did it to him?"

"Nope," the tech said, shaking his head slightly. "Besides his daughter, he was alone."

"What's the official cause of death?" Balthazar asked as he observed the body with his actual medical student skills.

"Ah, Doc's not sure," he said. "He's thinking massive stroke, maybe an aneurysm? Something burst up in there, that's for sure."

"What do you mean?" Balthazar asked.

"Intense cerebral bleeding. This guy had more blood in his skull than anyone I've ever seen," he said.

"The eyes," Balthazar said. "What would cause something like that?"

"Capillaries can burst. See a lot of bloodshot eyes with stroke victims," he said.

Castiel had heard many stupid things from people who didn't understand the supernatural, and this was definitely one of them. _Bloodshot eyes_ were not the same as _liquefied_ eyes. "Yeah?" he said. "You ever see exploding eyeballs?"

"Nah, that's a first for me," he said. "But hey, I'm not the doctor."

"You think we could take a look at that police report?" Castiel asked. "You know, for our paper."

"I'm not really supposed to show you that," he said suggestively, and they all knew what he was saying.

"Oh, come on," Castiel muttered as he watched Balthazar pull out his wallet and hand him more money.

* * *

They drove to the Shoemakers' home, where the funeral was being held. Castiel felt kind of bad, intruding something as private as a funeral, especially since this was two girls' _dad._ But still, they walked through the crowd of black-clad attendees, and Castiel muttered, "Feel like we're underdressed."

They walked out to the back of the house and ask someone where Jill and Donna, the daughters of the late Steven Shoemaker, are. They were sitting with their friends as Balthazar and Castiel approached.

"Are you Donna?" Castiel asked her when the girls looked up.

"Yeah," she said quietly.

"Hi—we're really sorry," Balthazar said softly, conveying his condolences to them in the gentle way he spoke to them.

"Thank you," Donna, who was the older daughter, said, her voice still low.

He nodded. "I'm Balthazar, and this is Castiel," he told them. "We worked with your dad."

Donna frowned at the girl next to her slightly, seeming skeptical for some reason. "You did?" she asked, smiling at them.

"Yeah," Castiel said. "This whole thing. I mean, a stroke."

Donna looked down into her lap.

"I don't think she really wants to talk about this right now," Donna's friend next to her said, looking up at them.

"It's okay. I'm okay," she said, looking over at her friend.

* * *

They learned that it was Bloody Mary doing all of this. Another girl died, and a third was going to. Balthazar and Castiel knew they needed to summon Mary to kill her, and on the way to the shop where the mirror that Mary originated from they argued about who was guilty enough to do it. Castiel knew he was for many reasons, but he didn't bring up any of them. Balthazar seemed to think he was guilty, though.

"If this is about Jess—" Castiel started, looking over at his brother as they pulled up to the shop.

"It's not about Jess, Cassie," he snapped, but he was upset. Castiel knew because even though he was irritated, he called him _Cassie._ Whatever Balthazar did that he thought made him worthy of Bloody Mary scratching his eyes out, he was really ashamed of it.

"No. Balthy, it's okay, whatever it is," he said softly. "I'll handle it, okay? I'll do this for us."

He paused but then nodded. "Okay. Okay, thanks."

He followed his brother into the shop after Balthazar picked the lock. There were a lot of mirrors and the light that was coming in through the windows made the dark shop extremely creepy. They searched until they found Mary's mirror, and then Castiel took a big breath. "Bloody Mary," he said quietly. "Bloody Mary." He paused, glancing at Balthazar and clutching the crowbar in his hands. "Bloody Mary."

They waited for something to happen, and for a second nothing did. There was a light outside, obviously car lights. "Crap," Balthazar said. "I'll go check that out. Be careful, Castiel."

"I will be," he said. "Go."

Castiel waited another second before he spotted her in the mirror behind him. He turned quickly and smashed it, but she just darted into the next one. That one was smashed too, and he turned toward Mary's mirror. "Come on, you little bitch. Come to this one."

That seemed to piss her off. Castiel's reflection's expression hardened and he felt blood coming out of his eye. Unable to stand up anymore, he dropped the crowbar and fell to the floor, an unbearable pain in his chest and head.

"It's your fault," his reflection snarled angrily, and it was it was _it was all his fault._ "You're the reason she died, you know. That girl. If you hadn't been sidetracked by your girlfriend, the vamps wouldn't have gotten to her. And Gabriel is all your fault too. And the boy from Michigan. The woman from Oregon. The man from Georgia. They're all because of you. You've killed _so many people._"

He fell to his side, feeling blood stream from his eyes. All of the sudden, the mirror was smashed, and some of the pain and guilt was lifted from him. He sat up and looked up at his brother standing over him with his crowbar in hand.

"Cassie!" he said. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," he groaned out. "Where is she?"

"Oh my God," Balthazar said, looking behind Castiel. That was the least inviting sentence he'd ever heard. He turned around and saw Mary emerging from a mirror and coming toward them, flickering in the creepy way ghosts did. Castiel felt his eyes start to bleed again and he looked over at Balthazar to see them bleed. He was starting to get that heavy weight in his chest and head, but before it could take him over completely he grabbed a mirror and swung it in front of Mary. He wasn't sure if it would work but he was doing the first thing he thought of.

"You killed them!" Mary's reflection snarled at her. "All those people! You killed them!"

Mary choked and practically melted into a disgusting pile of blood. Castiel quickly threw the mirror he was holding and it shattered everywhere.

Balthazar and Castiel looked at each other, both of them taking breaths. "Hey, Balthazar," he got out.

"Yeah?" he said, looking over at him and wiping the blood from his eyes like tears.

"This has got to be… what? Six hundred years of bad luck?" he said.

Balthazar chuckled weakly and shook his head. "Shut the fuck up, man."

He smiled slightly and stood up after a second, his head thumping with his heartbeat painfully. He looked over at his brother and helped him up. "Listen, even if we don't talk about Jess, we've got to talk about whatever your dark secret is," he said quietly. "Charlie's wasn't her fault, and I'm sure yours isn't either."

He looked at him and shook his head. "No, Castiel," he said quietly. "I'm not talking about it. Not right now."

"Maybe another day?"

"Maybe."

That was good enough for him for now.

* * *

Back at the motel, they both slept for hours longer than they usually would have let themselves, and neither of them complained. When they woke up, they packed to leave to a diner and then head back to Bobby's. It was six in the morning, but it felt like three for how tired Castiel still felt as he showered and rubbed the remaining bloodstains from his cheeks and the rest of his face. He drifted back off accidentally while Balthazar was showering, and he was woken up to an annoyed grunt and a pillow thrown at him.

"Mmmgrhnnnn," he groaned as he sat up and looked around, blinking. "Time to go?"

"Yeah," he said, pulling his bag into his arms and holding it in front of him like he was hugging it. Castiel slung the bag over his head and hung it around his neck like a necklace, and they both drudged to the car, tossing their bags carelessly into the backseat and sitting in the parking lot of the motel for a second, contemplating the world and why the hell they were awake right then. At one point Castiel realized he was dazing off and slumping toward his brother, but he didn't realize this until Balthazar roughly shoved him away, muttering, "Fucking fuck off, dude, I'm tired too and I want some fucking shitty diner pancakes." That was basically a perfect summary of both of their moods, until their guardian angel appeared in the back seat between their bags.

"_Dude,_" was the first word out of Balthazar's mouth. He looked back at him, irritated. "You're interrupting breakfast."

Dean was confused. "I see no food," he said.

"We're going to get it. Don't flip out, Balthazar," Castiel said. "I'm driving." He turned the key in the ignition and started driving out of the lot. "So, what's up, Dean? What's the verdict on the hunt for Gabe?"

Dean didn't speak for a moment, and Castiel frowned at him in the mirror questioningly. The look in his green eyes was sympathetic, and his heart dropped to the pit of his stomach. He nearly ran into the car in front of him at the red light, and the first chance he got, he pulled into a McDonald's parking lot and turned back to the angel, his gaze both horrified and angry at the same time. He couldn't find the words at the moment, and Balthazar was having similar issues. He felt like his throat was closing up, getting tight, and he didn't want to cry but he felt like he might.

"He's—_not._"

"No, he isn't dead," he assured them.

Castiel felt a weight lifted off his chest and he let out a big breath, and then took a big breath in. He was so relieved that he couldn't even begin to explain it. He was still scared of whatever Dean was going to tell them about Gabriel, but for the time being, it was okay, because he was alive, and that was the most important thing of it all.

"I'm not allowed to look for him any longer though," Dean said. He was angry. Castiel could tell this easily, and he was glad he was angry. If he wasn't angry about this, then Castiel wasn't sure he wanted to have Dean around anymore. He was glad that Dean cared, but that was the least important thing on his mind. The most important thing was _fuck the angels, we're looking for Gabe anyway. _"I'm sorry, Cas. I can tell you're very distressed and angry, and I understand, but there's nothing I can do. Unless you want me to fall from heaven and rid myself of my grace, making me completely useless to you and them, then there is nothing I can do."

He almost said _You're useless now anyway,_ but something held him back. He was angry, but he wasn't angry at Dean, or he would have. "You'd still be useful," he said. Dean's grace wasn't his top priority. Fuck his grace—if losing that brought them Gabriel, then Dean should've been so willing to give it up. Maybe he was being selfish, but he didn't care. He wanted his brother back. "We could teach you to be."

"Maybe, Cas, but there are many other reasons why it is very important that we remain bonded," he said. "For one thing, it is very painful to lose a bond between grace and soul. One day we might have to, because if we wait until you grow old and die, or until you or I die any other way, I don't know if the bond will be powerful enough by then for it to kill the other too. But we will do it in a way to bring the least amount of pain. Ripping the bond apart because I've fallen or your soul is destroyed will be the most painful thing either of us will ever experience. It leaves a mark on your essence, a part of you that should never feel physical pain."

"Bring on the pain," he muttered. "I don't care, as long as we get Gabriel."

"Castiel, you're being unreasonable," Balthazar said, but Castiel shot him a look and he rolled his eyes and looked out the window.

"Fine, then. If that doesn't motivate you, maybe this will," Dean said, also getting frustrated with Castiel's stubbornness. "If I am to fall, or somehow be taken from the bond in another way, then you will be assigned another angel, and no doubt they will assign someone a lot more obedient than I. Perhaps they will give you Uriel, or even John. If you are lucky, they may give you someone like Mary. But they will give you someone that will not tolerate even a fourth as much as I tolerate from you. I believe in you more than I believe in other angels. That includes you, Balthazar. And I believe we will get Gabriel back. I can't tell you where I think he is, but if I'm right, he isn't being killed or even tortured."

Castiel looked back at him, and he wanted to stay angry and stubborn, but he knew it was pointless. He sighed and started to drive out of the McDonald's parking lot, looking for some place to get shitty diner pancakes for Balthazar.

"Okay, we get that you can't do that without risking falling," Balthazar said, turning away from the window and twisting to look at Dean. "But why can't you just tell us and pretend like you didn't know?"

"I know when Castiel is getting himself in trouble, and that is, no doubt, trouble," he said. "Besides, even if I didn't know, I'd never let the two of you go without me. This isn't an insult to you. It's just that, if I am right, Gabriel is in a very, very dangerous place. He's okay, I assure you. I swear on my grace he is. The angels even _want_ him there. It's essential to the grand plan. I don't know how or why, but I just that this is how it is."

"I feel like you're not telling us everything," Balthazar said, rather boldly since the last time he said something Dean didn't like, the angel threatened to kill him, but after the No Talking Bad About God/No Manhandling of Castiel or Balthazar rules were established, even if Dean got annoyed with one of them or Bobby, he didn't act on it violently. He was actually pretty mellow most of the time anyway. And he was always funny. Castiel was pretty sure he liked to see what made humans laugh. It was interested how interested in these things he got.

"I am telling you everything I can that I know," he said. "I would tell you more if I could. I am trying to work in the best interests of all three of us and many other angel friends of mine. Believe it or not, I still consider a lot of them family, and I am still loyal to them in many ways. This is not just about the two of you."

"I know," Balthazar said. "Look, just… Thanks. For protecting us and stuff. And telling us what you can. I don't want you to end up getting someone you love killed, but… Gabriel is the most important thing to us. I can't speak for Castiel, but I don't give a shit about an angel war if Gabriel dies."

"That's how I feel too," Castiel chimed in.

"Exactly. So do what you have to, but our top priority is our brother," Balthazar said. He turned back to face forward in his seat again as they pulled up to a diner. He was out of the car almost as soon as they parked. "C'mon. I'm still tired and I want some shitty diner pancakes."


	7. Chapter 7

_"C'mon. I'm still tired and I want some shitty diner pancakes."_

* * *

They went back to Bobby's and ended up not seeing Dean for a while. Sure, he popped in one day to say hi and ask them go out for pie, and Balthazar and Castiel agreed happily. Bobby said he had work to do, so they leave him behind and accompany the angel to a pie place he found in Nevada. What he was doing in Nevada looking for pie places, they didn't ask. They sat down and looked through the pie selections. They were actually pretty used to flying by then and no longer felt extremely dizzied right after, and so both of them were in a lot better spirits than usual after just being taken from one place and plopped down in another.

Dean, however, looked nervous. "I didn't just come because I wanted pie," he told them.

"We figured," Castiel said. "Is it more on Gabe?"

"No," Dean said quietly, sighing. "That's come to a standstill since I asked to go where I think he is. I'm sorry. But I promise he's still alive and well."

Balthazar looked to Castiel for confirmation that Dean was telling the truth. When he nodded to him, he looked back down at the list of flavors. This time, though, Castiel wasn't satisfied with the angel bullshit that Dean was dealing with. He wanted answers. He wanted his brother. He wasn't willing to wait much longer, and if he was forced to… well, he was going to get pretty pissed off, more so than he already was.

"Look, this needs to stop," Castiel said. For a second, Dean looked worried, and Castiel could feel the worry too. He wasn't sure why, and he frowned slightly, catching Dean's green eyes and locking onto them questioningly.

"You don't mean me coming, do you?" he said. "I can't stop coming." Castiel frowned for a second more, and looked over at Balthazar, confused by Dean's reaction. His brother looked at them both knowingly before shaking his head and rolling his eyes. "Cas, is that what you're saying?"

Oh. _Oh._ He had hurt the guy's angelic feelings. He had to keep coming. It was his job, his duty. But he wanted to be _wanted_. He wanted them to consider him a friend. Castiel could understand that. If he was tied to someone for an indefinite amount of time out of necessity, he'd want to be friends with them too. It would make the indefinite amount of time he was tied to them bearable. Actually, wait. He was tied to someone for an indefinite amount of time, and he didn't really have a choice about it. Yeah, he liked being friends with Dean. If he didn't trust him or like him, the bond would be really annoying and a bit awkward. As it was, things were good. He actually looked forward to when Dean would show up, and not just because that meant they might be one step closer to Gabriel. He enjoyed Dean.

"No," he said, shaking his head. "Of course that's not, Dean. You're great. I don't want you to stop coming. Of course I don't." He smiled. "You cute dipshit."

For a long second there was silence, and it took that entire second for Castiel to realize he'd called Dean _cute._ Dean seemed to take the entire second to process it too, and by the time it was up, they were both beet red in the face and looking down at the table.

"You two are idiots," Balthazar said, raising an eyebrow at them.

"I mean cute as in—like—you know, you can call a friend cute," Castiel said, looking between them. "Don't look at me like that. You can. … Don't look at me like that, _you can!_"

"Okay, whatever, Cas, calm the fuck down," Balthazar said, rolling his eyes.

Dean looked at him. "You called him Cas," he said.

Castiel's brother looked at Dean and shrugged. "Yeah. I like the nickname."

"Me too."

"Anyway, I—um. Oh, yeah," he said. "I was just going to say that there is talk of demons being out for you. Keep an eye on that. Pray to me if you see any signs of it, okay? I'll come immediately. For now, I have to go, so… I'll just…"

Suddenly they were back at Bobby's, and Dean was nowhere to be found. So much for pie.

* * *

Dean didn't come back for at least a week after that, and Castiel was slightly grateful. He got a lot of teasing from Balthazar about the little slipup of words, but it had mostly blown over by the time they got word in from their angel. He showed up, completely wrecked with worry, and Castiel was surprised he hadn't felt it before he showed up. He stepped toward them, fear making his green eyes a lot less vibrant than usual. He immediately trapped Castiel in a surprised hug, and Castiel flailed for a second. He would definitely get teased for this too.

After a moment, because this hug seemed to go on uncomfortably long, he hugged Dean back, frowning slightly. "Dean, what's up?" he said softly. Dean's relief was flooding his mind. "Hey, come on, Dean, what's going on?"

"I was told that you were dead."

That was it. That small sentence summarized and justified every ounce of worry and then relief that Dean was piling on him, even if it was giving him a bit of a headache. When he pulled away, it was almost like Castiel missed the contact, wanting Dean to _know_ he was alive. Dean was still so worried about him that it was doing all these stupid things to him, causing his brain to have this almost undeniable _urge_ to reassure Dean wholeheartedly that things were okay.

Yeah, the bond had its ups and downs, and that was definitely a really weird down.

"What's going on, Dean?" he said quietly. Their eyes were locked, and Castiel knew that Balthazar and Bobby were staring, but he didn't care. What mattered was Dean, and whatever was happening.

"Demons. I told you they were after you. Well, they're coming now," he said. "I was told that you were dead, I think to scare me, and it worked."

"Wait, hang on," Bobby said. "Demons are coming _here?_"

"Yes," Dean said, looking up at him. "And I can't stay. I'll have another—"

"No, wait, you have to stay," Castiel said. "You can't go out there if demons are coming. You're staying with us."

"They're not after me, Cas," he said. "Look, I really want to stay, but I can't. The angels would be pissed if I did. I just—I'll leave a friend of mine to watch over you and keep them out. His name's Adam. He's a bit of a dickhead, as you'd call him, but he'll keep you safe."

"No, huh-uh, we're not putting our lives in the hands of some dickhead angel," Bobby said.

"Yeah, no way," Castiel said.

"You three don't really have a choice," the angel said forcefully, the fear in his eyes suddenly giving way to anger. The anger softened quickly, however, and he sighed. "I'm not giving you an option. He's coming. I'll see all of you later." His eyes locked with Castiel for a second again before he disappeared.

Before any of them could form a coherent thought, another angel took his place. This one had bluish-gray eyes, blonde hair—Castiel had decided over time that saying Dean's hear was _blonde_, even if saying it was _almost blonde, _was inaccurate; he was decidedly _brown-haired._ Light brown for sure, but brown. Whatever, Dean didn't matter at that moment. Cas wasn't really sure why he was so focused on the color of his hair. He was king of angry with Dean, but at the same time, he wanted him just back and safe.

"Hello," the angel said, looking between all of them. "Do you have wine here?" They stared at him blankly and he rolled his eyes. "All right, then. I'm Adam. You are the famous Castiel Novak, yeah? Dean sent me. You know—the one in the leather jacket that's totally in love with you."

Cas rolled his eyes. "Whatever. You're just here to keep the demons out."

"So I am," Adam said, smiling at them. "I'd also like some kindness and alcohol for my services. No? All right, well, I'll set up some sigils and then we'll work on the kindness and alcohol part."

Adam walked away from the three of them, leaving them all standing there staring. "No, it's okay, I don't need any help or anything!" he called sarcastically.

"What the fuck kind of messed up angel did your boyfriend send us, Cas?" Balthazar said, rolling his eyes in the direction of Adam.

"If I hear one more thing about me being 'in love' with Dean or vice versa I'm going to stab something," Cas muttered, turning to follow Adam and to help him with sigils. He knew his mother had known a lot, but he'd only learned one or two, and sigils against demons were extremely helpful. He wanted to learn them. And he was also wondering what kind of messed up angel his "boyfriend" sent them.

Adam was at the front door, painting a devil's trap with paint he must have summoned from out of his angelic ass because they didn't have bright pink paint before. He pushed the rug back over the trap and looked up at Castiel, waving him over. "You know how to paint a devil's trap, right?"

"Yeah," Castiel said, nodding.

"Okay," he said. He set his paintbrush over his bucket and conjured another bucket and brush, handing it to Cas. "I want you to draw them all over the edge of the house. Draw as many as possible. Not just in front of windows and doors leading out. All along the walls. Because, newsflash, demons can break down walls. It's a common mistake that leads to a lot of deaths and you look like the typical idiot so I'll repeat myself: _literally all along the walls._ Got me?"

Cas rolled his eyes. "Yeah, yeah. I want to learn more sigils though."

"Okay, then, do that last," Adam said. "Come outside, we're going to make the place visible to demons."

"Really? You can do that?" he asked, following Adam as he picked up his bucket of paint and went outside.

He nodded. "You can do a shit ton with sigils, buddy," he said. He closed the door behind him as they went outside and started to paint a complicated mass of bright pink lines. "So, you and Dean have that whole bond thing going on, right?"

"Yeah. Why'd he send you?" Cas asked, watching him finish up the sigil and move to the first window. He drew a different one. The bright pink made it look less like a symbol to keep demonic presence away and more like a little kid scribbling.

"I was close with him once," Adam said, painting more lines that Cas was trying to memorize. "Then I decided I want out of the angel business, and he didn't. So I faked my death, and I never told him."

"That's kind of shitty," Cas said.

"Yeah, well," he said. "You'd be surprised what the angel life entails. C'mere, draw the next one."

Cas stepped forward and painting with his bright yellow paint the same sigil that Adam drew, if slightly sloppier. They moved onto the other windows in silence. The sounds of dogs barking and cats meowing and Bobby's neighbors going about their business made Cas feel a bit sick. All of this would be disturbed and people might be killed because of his relevance to the angel world. Was it him, though? They couldn't really be sure. Dean hadn't given them a thorough description of the situation.

"Dean talks about you like you're God or something," Adam said, glancing over at him. "_The precious right—_ Sorry, actually, I can't say. But you're pretty big. But not as big as he makes you out to be." He looked back at the window again. "Actually, the way he talks about you, it kind of reminds me of how he talks about humanity. Like he thinks you're the perfect example of a human or something. I can't exactly disagree, seeing as I hardly know you, but I'm going to guess and say you're not the perfect example of a human being."

"I'm not," Cas said, confused as to why Dean would talk about him like he was. He was far from it.

"He's very intent on sticking to our original mission," Adam said with a little, exasperated sigh. "Protect humans, protect each other, serve our Father. He's so good. It's annoying."

"Do you have a crush on him or something?" he asked, raising his eyebrow.

"Are you kidding me? No," Adam said, rolling his eyes. "Most angels are siblings. Dean and I are siblings. I do—I admire him though. He's the kind of person that could be a great leader if he put himself to the task. He's very… respectable."

"You were his best friend, then," Cas said. "And you just left him?"

"Yes," Adam said. "Please don't question me. It pisses me off. I had my reasons. I made my mistakes, but I did what was best for me."

"You were his family," he said, frowning at him. "How did he found out you're alive?"

"An angel I ran across ratted me out," he said. "Word got around to him. And here we are—buddy-buddy again. Come paint another sigil."

Cas did as he was told, but as he did so, he said, "You were his _family,_ Adam. You don't just do that to family."

"I did what I thought was right," he said.

And normally, that would be it. Cas would respect that. He understood what it was like to do what you thought was right but still fail, and if that were the case with Adam, he wouldn't be angry with him anymore. He would drop it. But that wasn't it. What Adam did was _selfish,_ was walking out on family when they needed you most. And, because he was abnormally protective of Dean as of late, maybe because there was danger in the future for him which made him want to be more protective—anyway, it really aggravated him that he did it to Dean. _Dean_, who was selfless and brave and really just… _good._

"You did what was right for you. Not everyone else," Cas said.

Adam looked over at him, both of them stopping in their painting when he did. The force of his gaze was intense, almost equal to Dean's angry glares. "Castiel, there's a little thing you really need to learn," he snapped at him. "Sometimes, doing what's right for yourself is the right thing. No one died because I left. They grieved, they moved on, and I didn't end up going insane and killing a bunch of innocents. Kindly shut the fuck up, jump off your high horse, and accept that you're not the number one brother. Neither am I, honestly, but you need to stop thinking you are." He let out a little puff of breath like Dean sometimes did. "Now go paint the devil's traps. I'll handle the ones out here."

…

Adam stayed away from them, frustrated with Castiel, but they didn't mind. They went down to the panic room that Bobby had apparently built on a weekend off—_"Bobby, you're fucking _awesome_"_—and twiddled their thumbs.

"So…" Balthazar said after a second. "What did you do to piss Adam off?"

"Nothing," Castiel said. He didn't want to have to try to explain about why he had said all he'd said, about the way the bond made him feel. He sighed slightly and leaned against the wall they were sitting next to.

"Castiel," Bobby said, frowning at him slightly. "We should talk about something."

Balthazar looked at Bobby knowingly but questioningly, like he thought he knew what he was going to say but wasn't sure if he was actually going to say it. Which meant they'd talked about him. Discussed what Dean meant to Castiel. Discussed the bond that they'd never truly understand. Yeah, great, they were concerned about him. That was probably good. But that didn't mean they should've been talking behind Cas's back about something they didn't really know anything about except the simplest details. No matter how well Dean described it to them, it would never scratch the surface of the complexity of the bond.

"About what?" Castiel said tentatively. He frowned at the two of them; wary of whatever it was they'd talked about behind his back. "About me and Dean, right?"

"Yes," Bobby said. "Look, we get it. You're stuck with this bond thing. But that don't mean you've gotta be as comfortable with it as you are. Question Dean more often."

"Question him?" he said, raising an eyebrow. "Bobby, I understand a lot about him. I know I don't know everything, but we can trust him. He cares about us."

"No, Cas, he cares about the plan," Balthazar said quietly. "He doesn't care about us."

"No, you don't get it," Cas said, looking away. He refused to let them try to convince him that Dean wasn't the best, truest person they'd ever come in contact with, that Dean didn't care about them and enjoy his time with them. Cas could feel that this was true, and they just _didn't understand._ It made him angry. It wasn't fair to Dean for them to be talking like this about him. It wasn't fair to him that they didn't trust him because he trusted them wholeheartedly and he just wanted to befriend them and protect them.

"Yes, we get it better than you do. Your vision isn't clear because of the soul-and-grace bond," Balthazar said.

Castiel looked over at them, eyes narrowed slightly. "No. Adam said he talks about me like I'm _God_, and you've heard him talk about God."

"Adam's not a reliable source," Balthazar said. "We hardly know him."

"We can trust him. Dean trusts him."

"Damn it, Cas," Bobby snapped, looking at him with frustration written all over his face. "You're gonna get yourself killed. No, shut up, don't talk. You're gonna not talk for a minute here. You're gonna listen to _us_ talk."

"No," he said. He stood up and walked to the other end of the panic room. "Hell no. Nothing you say is going to convince me that Dean isn't trustworthy in every freaking way."

"Cas, you need to just _listen_—" Balthazar said.

He was cut off by Adam bursting into the panic room. "They're here," he said. "Come on, I need all of you to help me finish the sigils _now._"

The three followed Adam quickly, forgetting momentarily what they were talking about. The only thing they could think about was getting this shit _done_ before any demons came in and killed them. Cas felt the familiar fear mingled with excitement that came with cases as they grabbed the brightly colored paint buckets Adam had conjured for them. They painted hot pink and sky blue devil's traps and other sigils that Adam showed them all around the house.

"Did you get the back room?" Bobby asked, looking up at Adam.

Adam's eyes widened slightly. "There's a fucking back—Oh, fucking hell, we're screwed."

And they pretty much were, because at that second they heard the sound of the backdoor being broken and three or four pairs of footsteps coming through the part of the house with the least sigils and devil's traps. The excitement dissipated and gave way to a chorus of _oh shit oh shit oh shit_ in Castiel's mind. The three of them looked to Adam, and a long silver blade fell from his sleeve. He caught it by the end and raised his grip on it. Then he stepped forward and looked back at the others.

"Well, shit," he said, "I haven't done this in a while!"

Castiel was pretty sure that that was exactly the type of words that someone like Adam would have as their last words. That, or _Oh, fucking hell, we're screwed._ That sounded very Adam's-last-words-ish too.

"What do we do?" Balthazar said.

"Just start screaming exorcisms no matter what," he said. "Go get salt and grab a few gallons of holy water."

"Right. Perfect plan," Balthazar muttered. When they ran to the kitchen to get salt and holy water, he said, "We're gonna die. Fuck, this is it. Goodbye, life. Goodbye, house. Goodbye, couch."

"Balthazar, would you shut the hell up?" Castiel said, looking over at him.

"What?" he said. "I'm imitating Gabriel."

Bobby and Cas smiled slightly. There was one time when they were at Bobby's and they watched a scary movie. Gabriel was maybe thirteen, and even though he was part of a hunter family, he still got freaked out by some horror movies. When it was over, he heard a creak or something, and suddenly shouted out, _We're gonna die! Fuck, this is it. Goodbye, life. Goodbye, house. Goodbye, couch._

They marched out with the holy water and salt to find one demon already dead on the floor, but the other three were still fighting him. Balthazar stopped dead in his tracks, staring at one of them wearing a girl with really short, light blonde hair.

"Balthazar," Castiel said. "What are you doing? Come on!"

"Right," he said quietly. He stepped forward, and Cas turned his attention back to the demons, who were overwhelming Adam even with Bobby throwing a ton of holy water at them. They screeched, hissed, and burned, and then went back to beating Adam senseless.

"Make—a—salt line!" Adam shouted at them. "Quickly!"

They did, separating the three of them from Adam and the demons attacking him. It was a weak defense, but it would hold them off so they could start shouting exorcisms.

"_Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanica potestas—_" they shouted together, except after a second Cas realized that Balthazar wasn't shouting with him and Bobby and he looked over at him, frowning. Balthazar was flinging holy water halfheartedly at the demons. They had to keep on with the exorcism. The demons were turning their attention to the humans screaming it now. "—_omnis incursion infernalis adversarii, omnis legio, omnis congregatio…_"

The salt line was broken with a gust of wind coming out of the mouths of the demons. The humans stepped back as Adam slumped against the wall, driving his finger into one of his wounds. Cas didn't know why. It didn't look good, but he didn't have time to question him.

Bobby and Cas ran backwards together, looking around frantically, throwing salt and what was left of their holy water but not daring to keep going with the exorcism until they came to the next devil's trap, which was too far away for them to be hopeful…

Cas looked over to make sure that Balthazar was okay, only to find him _gone._ Suddenly he was panicking worse than before and he felt his breath get quicker. "_Balthazar!_" he screamed. "Balthy?!"

"Bobby, Cas, Balthazar—_close your eyes!_" Bobby and Cas did so as soon as Adam screamed this, and suddenly there was a flash of light. When it was gone and Cas opened his eyes, the demons were nowhere to be seen, not counting the one that was dead on the floor.

"Sent them back to hell," Adam panted out. "Very complicated little thing. Where's Balthazar?"

"I don't know," Cas said, looking around. "I don't know—he disappeared! He's—He disappeared!"

"Whoa, Cas, calm down," Adam said, standing up slowly. He made his way over to them and looked around, frowning. "He's really gone, isn't he? Hey, don't panic. Dean and I will find him, I swear. I just—he's _gone._"

"_Yeah!_" Cas said. "You have to find him now! Like, _right now!_"

"Hey, Cas, if they took him, they're not going to kill him," Adam assured him. He looked up at him, his panic only increasing as torture came to mind. "Look, I don't know much about this angel plan, but maybe that's what's going on. Maybe this is part of the angel plan."

"That makes sense," Bobby said. "And Dean brought Adam here because it's part of the plan."

"No way," Cas said, turning to Bobby. "Dean wouldn't do that."

"He wouldn't," Adam said forcefully. "Not if he knew that Balthazar was going to get taken. He's too good. He's too—_Dean._" He let out a sigh. "You guys can't stay here. Why don't you stay at my place for a while, and Dean and I can look for Balthazar? We'll have him back in no time, I swear."

Cas paused, looking to Bobby. He didn't know what to do. He wanted to look to Gabriel, to Balthazar, to Dean, but they were all gone. Dean was off with his business, and Gabriel and Balthazar were who knows where and in danger. His fallback was Bobby, but Bobby was no help when he was insisting repeatedly that Dean couldn't be trusted. It really made him angry when he did that, and he didn't want to look to Bobby because of it. But he knew he had no other choice, no one else to. Adam didn't really count in this case.

"Yeah," Bobby said. He was worried about Balthazar, no doubt, but he was better at control his anger and fear and worry than Cas was. "That sounds like the safest plan, even if I don't really wanna head out to your place."

Adam rolled his eyes. "Why do you have no faith in angels? Isn't that what we're for? For you humans to put your faith in us?"

"I'm not a real religious person," he muttered.

"Whatever. Come on." He snapped his fingers and they were in a large room with wooden floors and big, dark, wooden double doors. It was a very fancy room, or it would've been if there weren't colorful party lights flashing and outdated party music playing. "Oops. Sorry. Forgot I left this on." He snapped again and regular lights turned on, the music dying out. "Well, I'm going to talk to Dean. You two make yourselves comfortable. The bedrooms are somewhere, I think."

"Can I come with you?" Castiel asked. "I want to talk to Dean too."

"No," Bobby said, looking at him. "No, Cas, we need to talk."

Cas ignored Bobby entirely, still looking up to Adam. He shook his head, though. "I'm sorry, Cas. I'm going with Bobby on this one. If Dean has anything he wants to tell you, I'll relay it to you when I'm back."

Castiel sighed. "Okay," he said. He glanced at Bobby and then walked through the big double doors, not waiting for Adam to disappear to leave. He looked around at the hallway in front of him. Stairs on the right led up to another hallway looking down over this one. He went up the stairs, looking around. He could hear Bobby behind him calling for him to stop, but he didn't. He didn't want to talk to him. He didn't want to talk to anyone except Dean or Balthazar or Gabriel.

He missed Gabriel so badly sometimes that it hurt, and now that Balthazar was missing too, all that aching and missing was amplified, mingling with worry and fear. He wanted Balthazar back. He wanted Gabriel back. He wanted Dean back. He wanted to sit down with all three of them and maybe not even say anything, just see all of them alive and well and _there._ He was always afraid for Dean; always worried things would go upside down for Gabriel. The one thing he had going about that was that he never had to worry about Balthazar. He was always right there. And now he wasn't.

Finally he sat down at the end of the hallway and looked up as Bobby made his way down the hallway. He sighed and grunted as he sat down in front of him. "I need a fucking beer," he muttered, looking at the younger man.

"I need my brothers," he said quietly.

"Yeah, I know," he said. "I want them back too. I'm scared too, Cas, but sitting here whining about how dreamy Dean is isn't going to help shit."

Cas glared over at him. "I never said Dean was dreamy."

He rolled his eyes. "Listen, Cas. Dean's okay. He's good to be around. I'm just saying, it's too good. He's too good. We can't have had all this shitty luck all these years for there to be some perfect guardian angel looking out for you."

"He has to follow the plan," he said. "The bond didn't really do anything until his grace came in contact with my soul." He remembered when Dean explained this to him, when things with Gabriel were still bleak and his relationship with Balthazar consisted mostly of fighting a lot. Dean fixed everything. He knew that things couldn't stay good about Dean forever, but for now, he really did. He made everything better. Cas was so willing to let Dean become his best friend and stay like that forever. Maybe not a bonded best friend, but a best friend nonetheless.

He cared about Dean. He trusted Dean to bring his brothers back to him. He trusted Dean to not let him or them get hurt. Dean was, honestly, their only chance to get Gabriel and Balthazar back, so even if Bobby didn't like him or didn't trust him, he needed to suck it the fuck up and get over it because he would sell his fucking _soul_ for his brothers' safety.

Cas didn't really listen to whatever else Bobby said. He zoned off, thinking about what it would be like after they were all safe for once.

Dean was the one that was going to make that happen.

* * *

**I feel like there might have been a bit too much Cas pining for Dean? Idk. The bond thing is kind of hard to do without making Cas seem like a clingy dork and it feels like a poor excuse to put Dean and Cas together with, which is why I don't plan to keep it around forever. It's just a good excuse for having Dean come in what is essentially season 2 since I kind of half-skipped over the plot of season 1.**


	8. Chapter 8

**So John is basically Raphael since Raphael is the Novak brothers' dad. **

**Dean's POV in this chapter.**

* * *

_Dean was the one that was going to make that happen._

* * *

Adam came back a while later, after Castiel had escaped from Bobby and found a room to claim as his own for the time being. He twiddled his thumbs, trying not to fall asleep. He refused to until Balthazar was safe. He couldn't bear living without both of his brothers. He ached on the inside, remembering how it felt to be this alone. It was how he felt right after Gabriel disappeared, before he had taken Balthazar from Stanford.

He shouldn't have ever done that though. Maybe Jess would still be alive…

He was just very upset, and he needed someone to hug, but he wasn't the type of person to walk up and ask, _Can we have an extremely meaningful, long hug because I'm very sad?_ He was the type to just scowl and say forget about it or sometimes, maybe, if he was a little drunk or just _really upset_, or maybe really angry, he'd spill out everything he was feeling and thinking and make sure you remembered it. There really was no in-between. And there certainly was no hugging.

Adam came into his room without knocking. He poked his head in, saw Castiel was in there, and moved over to him. He stood awkwardly in front of the bed and looked around the room. "So," he started, "Dean didn't have much to say. He just wanted me tell you he'd ensure that Balthazar was brought back safely."

"What else did you talk about?" he said.

"Nothing I can tell you about," Adam said, shrugging slightly. "It's angelic business. You would be bored with it. I am."

"But it involves me, doesn't it?" he asked, looking up at him. He had decided that he was sick of staying so far in the dark. "So just… literally anything. Any bit of information you can give me, give it."

Adam rolled his eyes. "You're at the damn center of a holy shit storm, kiddo," he said. "And instead of partying with the Pagans every other weekend like I should be, I'm being pulled in too."

"You hang out with Pagan gods?" he asked, raising his eyebrows. "And Dean still trusts you?"

He nodded. "I'm what you'd call a 'trickster.' A lot of people believe me to be Loki. The real Loki died a while back. I'm just a powerful Seraph with an assload of magic and stolen angelic weapons at my disposal." He paused for a second. "But you're gonna forget about the stolen angelic weapons part. I don't use them. I like having them for leverage."

Castiel was too tired and angry and upset to care about any of that at the moment. All he said was "Makes sense." He yawned slightly, finding it harder and harder to keep his eyes open, even in the middle of the conversation. He was beyond exhausted. "Just go find my brother, please."

"Gotcha." He disappeared, and Cas was left alone again.

* * *

When Bobby and Cas next heard from Adam, it wasn't very good news. He returned with Balthazar in tow, and at first Cas was ecstatic when he saw him, rushing to him and going to hug him, but then Adam told him _it._ The thing. The very bad thing.

"Cas," Adam said. "There's something you need to know about your brother here before you go hugging him."

He looked up at him, frowning slightly. He realized that Balthazar wasn't meeting his or Bobby's eyes, and that both of their faces were grim. His stomach dropped even before he heard what the bad thing was.

"I found your brother with the demons," Adam said. "_Doing business_with them."

At first this made no sense to him, because _no way in hell_ would his brother do business with demons. _No way in hell_ he would betray them like that. _No way in hell_ was this possible, so it didn't click with him at first. He stared between Adam and Balthazar's faces, and slowly he realized that yeah, this was true. Yeah, Balthazar was _doing business with demons._

"What business?" Bobby said. He seemed to comprehend it before Castiel, and he was _pissed._Rightly so, in Cas's opinion.

"Not selling my soul or anything," Balthazar said quickly, finally looking up at him. His eyes were full of shame.

_At least he's safe,_ a small voice in Castiel's brain thought. But it was small, and in the very back of his brain.

"Worse," Adam said, looking at Balthazar with a glare fixated on the young man. It made him look away, shrugging slightly. _What's worse than selling your soul?_ Castiel thought, but oh, yeah, he was about to find out. Adam let out a puff of breath, irritated greatly by Balthazar. "Fine, I'll say. He was being their own personal assassin in return for them looking for Gabriel."

Cas looked at his brother incredulously. The incredulous look stared there for a second. His mind was blank of anything more than more litanies of _No way in hell would Balthazar do something like that. No—way—in—hell._But it was true. It was true. He didn't know what he wanted to do. He didn't really know what he felt. He was just—struck _dumb_ at the idea of Balthazar being an assassin for demons. It was—_ridiculous,_almost, even if he did it for Gabe. No matter how much he believed in thinking you're doing the right thing, he couldn't apply _that_ to this situation.

Again, it was Bobby who said something first. "Hang on," he started, turning to look at Balthazar in the eye. He met Bobby's gaze briefly, but it must've been a hard thing to meet because quickly his eyes went downcast again and he fidgeted, not moving away from Adam. If he'd done that, he'd be more comfortable standing near a stranger he betrayed than family he betrayed too.

He was so angry with him. He was furious. How in the ever-loving _fuck_ could he do this to them? Even if it was to find Gabe, they could've died. Adam was so close to _dying,_ and he went off with them again. He _killed people._ That made him only a little bit better than the demons themselves, didn't it? He was so pissed he could explode, and was finding it hard to pull himself together and force the explosion down.

"Balthazar," Bobby said, his voice calm in that way that was worse than his voice being full of anger. He was trying to understand. Castiel looked at Balthazar and saw the misery in his eyes, two sides of him conflicting. One said it was good that he was suffering. He deserved it. The other felt sorry for him, felt like he should forgive him and move on and work through it all together. The sorry part was larger, but the part that demanded his little brother's misery was more stubborn, and strength won out over size, so he glared at him forcefully, trying to convey all of his anger into it.

Bobby went on, saying, "Did you—Is this true?"

They all knew it was. But maybe, like Castiel, the older man needed some confirmation from Balthazar himself. When he nodded, Cas felt his heart sink into the pit of his stomach. It was completely, totally, one-hundred-percent true.

"Okay, then. Have you killed any humans? Any _innocents?_" Bobby said. Cas could feel the fury he was trying to hold back. It sort of popped out of him when he said _innocents,_ a rush of anger that left Cas feeling sorrier for his brother and yet at the same time he knew that this was totally justified on Bobby's part. Of course they should yell at him a bit. _Of course._ He was an _assassin._ For _demons._

"No, of course not," Balthazar said. "They hadn't even asked me to do that yet. It was other demons that pissed them off. I wasn't alone usually. The demon with the short blonde hair—her name's Meg—she usually went with me. She gave me an angel blade and we took out demons together."

Relief ran through Castiel. He had thought for sure that Balthazar was going to say that he had, but now he knew he hadn't, he felt a little bad for assuming the worst of his brother. He really didn't know what to expect anymore. He felt like he didn't even really know his brother at all. He never would have guessed in a million years that he would do something like this.

Like he didn't trust Dean to find Gabriel, Cas realized, and the anger only grew.

He was a mess. Angry and then sorry and then relieved and then angry again in no time at all.

"So Meg," Cas said, finally finding his voice to speak. "You know her pretty well, since you're fucking hunting with her?"

"No, Cassie, please, it's not like that," he said desperately, looking at him pleadingly. "Please, you have to believe me. I hate her. I hate Meg _so much,_ and I hate all the others. Brady and Elisa and Drake—all of them, I hate them, okay? Especially Meg, since I've spent the most time around her. But I had to. It was for _Gabe,_Cas."

"We have fucking _angels_ looking for him," he snapped at him. "Do you not trust Dean's word? Do you not believe him?"

Balthazar huffed. "Damn it, Castiel! Yeah, I trust that Gabe's safe _for now,_ but I don't trust Dean to keep him that way if his angel superiors tell him to kill Gabe," he said. "It's my little brother too, and I'm going to protect him and find him if you won't." He looked to Bobby. "Right? He's too dependent on Dean."

He sighed. "Yeah, kid, he is," he said, and Cas wasn't really sure why he used the term kid, which he usually used affectionately. Now was not the time to be affectionate with Balthazar. His blood was boiling with anger the more his brother talked about the demons and about not trusting Dean or Cas like he should. "But Dean's our only chance. Demons aren't the way to go."

He looked between them, frowning. "Oh, come on. You're siding with Dean, Bobby?"

"Yeah, I am. I'm sorry," he said. "And you're not going back to the demons. You will be watched_constantly._ Got me?"

"I deserve that," he said, "but we have to do more than sit and wait for Dean."

The older man shook his head, sighing again. "No, Balthazar. We don't."

Balthazar was the one that looked betrayed now, which Castiel almost found funny when it was him that betrayed them in such a tremendous way. He wanted to turn away from Adam's place and never, ever speak to his brother again. He wanted to go off to some fucking college and learn to do what he wanted in life. He wanted to change his number and isolate himself from his family—other than Gabriel, when he was found. He wanted Balthazar to worry for_years_ if he was even _alive_ and not truly know where he was at any time, except that he_might_ be at college.

He wanted him to go through all the pain that Cas went through, and then be faced with this betrayal too. He wanted Balthazar to be bonded with an angel he didn't know and to learn to trust that angel because he was beyond certain that he was trustworthy, and then have everyone give him funny looks and doubt him for it. He wanted to betray Balthazar, and then try to play the _Well, you're too dependent on your angel__card,_even when it wasn't really Balthazar's fault that he was so dependent on the angel.

He wanted Balthazar to sit up while he was dead-tired, worrying that he wasn't going to come back, worrying that he wouldn't have a big brother anymore, even when that big brother had put him through so much shit when he did so much for that big brother. He wanted him to feel conflicted as he sat up and waited, helpless, and he wanted him to contemplate everything, to rethink everything he ever did, because of his big brother.

He wanted to be Balthazar, burdened with only some guilt for killing demons but not feeling the full weight of the guilt he _should have_ been feeling.

He just wanted things to be simpler for him. He wanted to be selfish, and dump all this pain on someone else.

He could never actually do this, though, and he knew it. Maybe, if he could, he'd dump everything on someone who deserved a lot of emotional pain. Like a demon that had just murdered a ton of people. They deserved to feel some human guilt and emotion. He'd dump all his shit on them, but never, no matter what he did, would Cas wish any sort of pain on Balthazar, not really, not while actually meaning it.

Adam broke up the slightly awkward silence that was starting to bloom between the three humans, all of them very angry for different, if vaguely similar, reasons. "I'll just leave you three to it," he said. He looked to Cas. "I'll see if I can get in contact with Dean."

Cas nodded as Adam disappeared, and he turned his gaze back to his brother. He stared at him for a second before shaking his head sadly. "I'm so… Fuck, Balthazar," he said quietly, his voice filling with a lot of emotions, not all of which he could quickly sort through and understand fully. He settled on anger, on sadness, on tiredness, the three that made the most sense to him. "I'm." He couldn't go on for a second, overwhelmed by these three emotions he'd chosen. "I'm so disappointed in you."

That was the last thing he got out before turning away from Bobby and Balthazar, going up to his room in Adam's weird little place that he seemed to stay at. He sat down on his bed, not sure what he was going to do now that he was away from them, but he was sure it involved sulking and getting angry and then feeling sorry and generally fluxing through emotions and feeling like shit, and soon, sure enough, that proved to be exactly what happened.

Castiel felt himself eventually drifting off, laying down on the bed. He was still exhausted. He couldn't get enough sleep lately, and it was catching up to him. Even with the brief, relative happiness he felt when Dean came, he wasn't sleeping well. How could he? With Gabriel gone, and Jess dead, and Balthazar a wreck… Slowly, he fell asleep. It was a light, fitful sleep, but sleep nonetheless, and who was he to complain about any sort of sleep at that point?

* * *

Dean was so confused. There were different sides to this war tugging him one way or another, and it was hard. It was hard on him, and he was sure that this was evident to the angels he served. No way they didn't notice his lack of performance as of late, especially the more he got to know and care about Castiel and his little family of hunters. He hoped they didn't think this was cause to reassign someone to Cas. He did not want that to happen at all. He couldn't deal with that happening.

He had a meeting with his superior to talk about Cas and Balthazar's views on the angel war, which seemed to be some of their biggest concerns. He knew that the Novak bloodline was one of the potential bloodlines to hold the vessels for Michael and Lucifer, but that all depended on if Gabriel survived this ordeal with Azazel, becoming the boy king as preparation for being the vessel. Then Cas or Balthazar would go through the trials of becoming Michael's vessel… Beyond that, he wasn't really sure what the plans were.

He was certain that this meeting was more than updating the higher-ups about Castiel and Balthazar, as most meetings were, though they were supposedly all for his updates on the two.

When Zachariah showed up, Dean felt like turning away and going back to Cas. But of course, he had his orders to not go to them as much… It was brutal, not being able to see the people that were quickly becoming very good friends to him. He was closer to them already than he was to a lot of his brothers and sisters, as guilty as that made him feel. He should've been more dedicated to them, but, he reminded himself, he had distanced himself from them a while ago. It was expected for him to not be as like them as he used to be, after spending time watching over the humans of his own accord, never choosing a vessel until it was time to become Castiel's guardian angel.

The angel's vessel was going bald, and he had an unpleasant face, one easily associated with that of a boss. Zachariah was the picture-perfect superior, and Dean's skin crawled every time he thought of reporting things about his friends back to him. He wished he was more powerful than him, wished he was a better Seraph so he could say _Fuck you, Zachariah,_ and push his way up to Michael and John, the leaders of the whole impending… impending… well, Dean wasn't entirely sure what was impending, just that the Novaks were right in the middle, and a lot of monsters knew already.

He had been told about the werewolf that had said that to Balthazar and Castiel. It was infuriating to many of the angels, that the unstable monsters that learned from demons or their fellow monster friends about the Novaks' relation to all of this would just spew it all out, thereby risking the plan altogether. Cas and Balthazar could not know yet. They wouldn't agree with it.

This felt disturbingly like manipulation to Dean, and he hated it. He cared about Cas. He didn't want to manipulate him.

"Heaven to Dean," Zachariah said, snapping in front of his face. He focused on the other angel, a bit embarrassed about zoning out. He had learned embarrassment from Castiel and the bond. It was an emotion he rather wished he hadn't picked up from him through their minds. Sometimes the bond wasn't totally great.

"It's… It's 'Earth to,'" Dean corrected him. He had heard one of the humans using this phrase before.

"What?" Zachariah said, frowning at him.

"You said 'Heaven to Dean.' The expression is 'Earth to Dean," he said, "because it pulls them back to Earth, I guess. Their heads are, uh, 'up in the clouds.' I don't really understand that one, but I heard Bobby, Castiel's friend, say it."

"Never mind. None of that is relevant. We are here about your human friends, though," he said. He motioned over to the seats in the fancy, beige room they were in. Dean sat down in a very soft, velvety brown chair, and watched as Zachariah took his seat across from him. A glass of alcohol appeared in his hand, and he motioned toward Dean questioningly. He shook his head.

"No, thanks," Dean said.

"All right. So, tell me, Dean, can you feel what Castiel is feeling right now?" he asked.

Dean shook his head. "It's not something I can turn on and off. If I focus, maybe, but he must be calm right now," he said. "I can't feel anything."

"Well, please try to focus," Zachariah told him. "This is about Castiel, mostly."

_Mostly._ He knew it. He wondered what Zachariah's other motives were this time, what task he would be put up to.

Dean sighed internally, forgetting about that for the time being and closing his eyes, tapping into the bond. He could always feel its presence now, even when he wasn't around Castiel. It was easy to tug onto it, to feel like Castiel was there in the room with him. The only difference was his bright, strong, forceful soul felt dimmed when he did this and Castiel wasn't actually in the room with him.

After a moment more of focusing, he felt an eruption of emotion, and he let the awareness of the bond drop instantly, so it was just in the back of his mind. He could still feel Castiel's strong emotions forcefully, though, and it had shocked him into making his head feel like he'd survived an angel blade going straight through it. It pounded, and with each pound, there came more pain, ache, and it throbbed mercilessly on for another second before diminishing enough he could look up at Zachariah, and then altogether.

"What happened?" he asked, not at all concerned. He was interested in whatever had just happened to Dean.

"I was focusing, and suddenly he felt something strongly," he said. "It hurt. I apologize for startling like that."

Zachariah shook his head. "No, it's okay. Tell me about it."

"He's angry," Dean said, "but also sympathetic, and very, very sad. Tired, too. He's been at least a little emotionally tired ever since the bond was strengthened in the barn in Illinois, though."

"Why? Do you know why?" he asked eagerly.

"No," Dean told him, "it doesn't work like that."

Zachariah nodded. "You should find out," he said.

"I would, if I were allowed to see them as I pleased," he said to him, looking up. "As it is, there are more important things to discuss him when I talk to him, and some of the time I spend with him is spent talking to Adam, who is taking care of them while I am not allowed to."

Zachariah frowned at him. "Well, then, limit your time talking to Adam," he said. "I don't want to increase your time with Castiel."

"Why not?" he asked. He usually refrained from asking _why_s and _why not_s, because angels didn't really appreciate that sort of thing, that curiosity that Dean picked up from his time on his own, watching the humans. And Cas. Cas taught him a lot. "I don't see how it can hurt. I'll learn more, the more I'm with him."

"Because," he said, rolling his eyes. "We know you're getting attached to them, Dean, and I'll tell you outright: The less time we give you with him, the more you'll get done. If we give you all the time in the world, you'll use it to talk to him, to get to know him. If we give you limited time, you'll use it to actually do what we need you to do."

Dean glared down at his lap and nodded slightly. "Okay," he said, wishing he could demand that he see Castiel as often as he pleased, that he be able to go wherever he wanted and do what he wanted like he used to. He wished he wasn't tethered to heaven, wished that the bond he and Castiel shared didn't make him vulnerable to their threats. He had to do as they said. He had to please them. He had to keep the Novaks and Bobby safe without tampering with what he believed would ultimately be a good plan the angels were thinking of.

But damn, he really missed being on his own.

"So, nothing else to report on Castiel and Balthazar, then?" Zachariah said. Dean could tell he was starting to get bored with him, which meant he was going to be sent off to do whatever he was told to do soon. It was better than sitting there miserably and listening to Zachariah lecture him about Cas, trying to think of something to tell him that would please him. He shook his head, and the other Seraph sighed. "All right, then. I want you to go talk to Adam, actually. Check up on your human friends for a bit first, take them back to Bobby Singer's house. I don't like them staying with Adam. But then talk to him."

_No._ He knew that the angels would not be against killing Adam or making him fall since he had pretty much completely separated himself from them. Now that they knew he was alive, there wasn't much that kept him safe to continue hanging out with Pagan god friends and wreaking havoc as he so pleased. It maybe wasn't a bad thing that Adam couldn't go about and do all of that anymore, but he didn't want to drag him down into this mess. He didn't want to strip him of his freedom like this as Zachariah and his buddies had done to him.

_No. Tell him no._

He couldn't do that to Adam. He couldn't.

_He would have every right to hate you if you brought him into this._

"Okay," Dean said quietly, against all of his better judgment, and wow, he really hated himself. "What do you want me to talk to him about?" With each passing second that he gave into Zachariah's wants, he hated himself more, but he couldn't disobey the orders of his superior. He couldn't. They had really made a good little soldier out of him, made it so he was nothing more. Made it so he was their little _bitch._

Castiel was feeling very unsatisfied with himself right then. So was Dean.

"Get out of him what he did when he faked his death," he instructed. "And what he thinks now, about the plans and being kind of involved now that he's dealing with the Novaks."

"You're not going to really get him involved, are you?" Dean asked, knowing he shouldn't feel hopeful, because as soon as he'd said _Okay,_ it was too late for Adam to not get too involved. Very easily either of them could be killed for being on one side or the other instead of peacefully neutral or blissfully unaware of the conflicts, and now he was forcing Adam to drag himself onto one side or the other, to endanger himself. He was so stupid. He was so selfish.

"I don't know," Zachariah admitted, and at least he seemed truthful. It was better than telling him _no_ straight-up with the intentions of _maybe_ getting Adam involved. "Why do you care? Wouldn't it be better to have another angel on our side?"

"Well, yes, obviously," Dean said, nodding, "but I just don't feel comfortable putting Adam in the middle of this and have him get hurt or something."

"Dean, this will be a war," he said. "People die in wars. They get hurt. They are changed. Things aren't going to be the same after all of this is over, nowhere near it." He grinned at him. "They will be better, even if a few good angels die along the way."

Zachariah didn't view a lot of them as more than just soldiers, more people on his side, more people that switched over because of him and made him look better in the eyes of Michael and John, or whoever was leading the angelic side of this big ordeal. Dean really wished someone more compassionate was in his superior's role, but he knew that they wouldn't be looking for someone who cared and would think too hard about the other angels in a leader position. They would put someone who could strategize almost mercilessly and get the job done. Who would search for things that would result in the least possible casualties, but would ensure in the end that no matter how many people died, they won. That was Zachariah.

"Uriel will be joining you when you go see Castiel after today, by the way," he said, almost as an afterthought.

Dean frowned at him. Uriel was a very, very obedient, cold angel. He cared for few, and never really tended to socialize much. He did as he was told without a second of thought to do otherwise, little to no free will in him at all. He was the perfect soldier, more so than even Dean. He was in a way that didn't make him their bitch though. He wanted to be like this. It made him a desirable weapon. Everyone wanted Uriel in their garrison. That was how things always were. Uriel wasn't in Zachariah's, but he must've been transferred there or in someone close to Zachariah's, for him to just decide to team him up with Dean for a while.

"Okay," he said quietly, though that was the last thing he wanted. "I, uh. I'm glad I know you don't trust me, Zachariah."

He didn't even know why he said it. It sounded so pathetic.

The other angel raised an eyebrow at him. "Go, Dean. Do as you're told."

He nodded, standing up and extending his wings out. With a quick flap, he was flying to Bobby's. He flew quicker than anything else in existed operated, but when he was flying, he could still feel every fraction of time pass, every flap of his dark wings. When he landed at Bobby's, he saw that there were no demons there anymore. There was no damage either. They seemed to have left as quickly as they came. He went to Adam's, and when he got there, he wished he could just go back up and fly for so long that his wings started to ache. But he did have a job to do, so he sighed and forgot about his wings for a moment.

"Castiel?" he called.

He looked around until he saw Cas and Bobby both coming out of separate rooms. Balthazar sheepishly poked his head out of a room too. As soon as he saw Dean, he went back in his room and shut the door. Dean frowned slightly.

"Your house is safe, Bobby," he called up to them. "You guys can go back now."

"Hey, Dean, can we talk?" Cas asked him, moving to go downstairs. His blue eyes killed Dean. He was so upset, and Dean didn't even know why, and he didn't have enough time to ask. He wanted to sit him down with a pie between them and talk for hours. He wanted to really become their friend.

Fuck, he wanted to so badly.

"No, I'm sorry," he said, sighing. He watched as Castiel's eyes became even more upset. "I've got a lot to do. I really want to, Cas. I want to just talk. Really, really badly. But I can't."

"No, it's okay," he said. "Just… next time you have an opportunity? I really need to talk to you."

"Yeah, of course," he said, knowing there wouldn't be a _next time he had an opportunity._ "Look, I need to talk to Adam. But when I'm done, I'll have him take you back home, and I'll get all the other shit I need to get done over with. Maybe later, okay? Tomorrow or something. We'll get pie." It was a stupid thing to say. He was so stupid.

He was so, so stupid.


	9. Chapter 9

**Things start to really heat up in chapter 11, and the season-two-like plot ends in chapter 13. Then we will move onto the events of season three. Which means Ruby and Bela and a lot more Adam and Sam and Gabriel (also the start of some Sabriel maybe?). Also, Ellen and Jo will probably be more involved than they were in the show. The roadhouse was originally supposed to be the boys' safe place to go, which is why it burnt down because the writers didn't want them to have a place to go. I guess they weren't thinking of Bobby's.  
**

**Well, anyway, likely the roadhouse won't burn down because I don't like that idea. So the boys will end up staying at the roadhouse a lot when they're closer to Nebraska and at Bobby's a lot when they're closer to South Dakota.**

**This doesn't mean I won't kill Ellen and Jo and Ash though. I might. I might not. But most likely I won't because I love Ellen and Jo and Ash.  
**

* * *

_He was so, so stupid._

* * *

The next time they saw Adam, he was quiet and didn't really talk much. He seemed upset, and none of them knew why. Castiel would have talked to Balthazar about it, but he stayed as far away from him as Bobby's house would allow. He stayed out of whatever room he was in if he could, and he went off in the Impala a lot. He went on a few cases, but he didn't tell Balthazar about them and he didn't ask him to join. He was completely distancing himself from his brother, and even though several times in the next few days he wanted to talk to him, he didn't.

He killed a nest of vampires and a coven of witches in the course of four days, which was better than usual, but considering that both weren't that far from Sioux Falls, it was a bit suspicious. Sioux Falls was usually a blind spot in terms of supernatural activity, and for both of them to show up so close together, without really any ties to the area or any reason to move there—well, it was weird. He should've told Bobby about it, or Balthazar, or someone, but he didn't. The only person he would actually talk to was Adam or Dean, and neither of them showed up until Adam did five days after they were told they could return to Bobby's.

"Hey," he muttered. "I'm just here to check in."

"Hi," Castiel replied. "Have you heard from Dean?"

He shook his head. "Not since the day he showed up to say you could come back. He, ah, he talked to me a little, but… yeah. No, not since then."

Castiel frowned at him a little bit. Adam seemed even more upset when he spoke even briefly about when Dean talked to him. He wanted to know what Dean said, what Dean was up to, why Dean hardly ever came anymore. He wanted to sit down and talk with him, get things straight, try to understand. He wanted Dean to understand. He wanted him to nod along as he listened to all of Cas's problems, and Cas would then willingly return the favor if Dean too wanted to just talk about things that were bothering him.

He just kind of wanted to be friends with Dean, like they were for a little bit when Dean first showed up in his life. He wanted to know why Dean seemed not to want this too. He wanted to know a lot of things. He wanted to just talk, and the person who, if magically, knew more about him than anyone else and knew about him on an emotional level like no one else could wasn't around.

"So… what did you two talk about?" Cas asked, almost hesitant. He didn't think Adam would answer, but to his surprise, he did.

He started out with a sigh. "He's so lost in all this stupid _bullshit_," he said, and the anger and the upset coursed freely through Adam's words, "that he's convinced he's gotta drag me down too."

Cas didn't understand this, or maybe he did but at first he didn't want to admit to himself that Balthazar and Bobby were right in some ways, in that Dean was very far gone into his angelic business. He frowned slightly at the angel in front of him, moving from his place at the kitchen. Balthazar and Bobby were both out getting groceries. That Bobby actually went out shopping when he could've had Balthazar go alone proved completely to Castiel that they were talking about him.

Adam seemed to see that Cas was confused, because he continued. "I don't know why else he would be asking me about what my 'views on the war' are," he said irritably. "At first he talked to me about my time when I faked my death, and I just… I spilled a lot out to him. If he had started out with asking me about my 'views,' I wouldn't have told him anything about my time after faking my death. I would've known it was just for his superiors. But… fuck, and now they've got all this information on me, and I'm sure he'll tell them. He's too passionate, you know, Cas? He's dug himself deep into this, and he believes in it, and he's going to do a lot of shit he wouldn't normally, like try to pull me into this.

"I just… I kind of shut him down, and then I… I just…" He let out an angry breath. "I just shut him down. I said, 'Listen, Dean, I think I know what you're doing, and if I'm right, then I have to ask you to leave my house.' And he did. He left. Wasn't angry. He was almost… apologetic." He looked directly at the human now. Cas was unnerved by the look in Adam's eyes. He didn't know what it was. It was… it was similar to that _intense_ look that Dean gave him back at Jess's visitation. "I wanted to believe him, but I couldn't, and as much as I hate to say this: Cas, maybe you should start being a little more careful with what you're careful telling Dean."

He stared at him for a second. When he finally looked away, he was frowning again, and he wasn't sure what to say. He put his trust fully in Dean. He could still feel that it was okay to trust Dean. Couldn't he? That little thing in the back of his mind, that little thing that connected them and was always saying _Yes, Dean's very trustworthy!_ was still there. Wasn't it? There was something, but Cas wasn't sure anymore if that something was still telling him to trust Dean.

He felt everything around him just… _crumbling,_ all that hope and that thing that resembled happiness crashing and breaking. What gave him hope before? The fact that Dean _was going to_ find Gabriel, bring him back safely, and watch over them to get them through this war without so much as a scratch on them. What gave him something that resembled happiness before? He was back with Balthazar, he had started to form a home at Bobby's, and he had Dean to look forward to, Dean to talk to, and Dean to help him.

What did he have left?

He had decreasing confidence in that Dean would bring Gabriel back to him safely and would ensure their safety through the war. He wanted little to do with Balthazar. He felt out of place and lost at Bobby's. Dean was slipping away from him. He wasn't to be trusted anymore.

His heart _ached._

"All right, well, good luck, Cas," Adam said quietly. "Next time you see Dean, you grab onto him and refuse to let go, okay? Try and sit him down and _talk _to him. I can't get through to him, but I think you can."

Just like that, he was gone, and Cas was alone in the kitchen again, finding it harder and harder to think, to do anything.

Bobby joined him in the kitchen twenty minutes later. Balthazar fled to his room. Cas watched as Bobby made himself a sandwich with the food he had just gone out to buy. His appetite from before Adam visited was lost.

"You okay, kid?" Bobby said, glancing at Cas. "You're starin' and you're real quiet."

"I'm fine." He wasn't fine. "I'm—I'm…"

"Yeah. Yeah, I get it," he said.

_No, you don't._ "Yeah."

There was an awkward silence for a moment, but then there was the sound of wings, and Cas looked up to see brilliantly green eyes looking at him. He really couldn't help it—he smiled up at him. He was happy to see him, happy to see those green eyes, but as quickly as it came, the smile dropped. Dean was worried, and angry, and almost confused, and these three things showed not only in his face but strongly in the bond.

"Dean?" Castiel quickly stood up and went to him, standing maybe a bit too close, but neither of them moved. "Are you okay?" Of course he was okay. But Cas just… he needed to be sure.

Damn. Dean's eyes were actually really nice.

"I'm fine, Cas," he said quietly. "We need to talk. But quickly, please."

Castiel frowned slightly and he shook his head. "No, Dean, not quickly. Either we have an actual conversation, or just leave."

Dean just looked at him a second before sighing heavily and saying quietly, "You have no idea how much I want to do that, Cas."

"Then let's."

He shook his head. "It's complicated, Cas, so I can't explain, but I can't. I can't have a nice little _chat._"

He strengthened his resolve, not really wanting to say what he knew he had to say next. He desperately didn't want to say it, but he did: "Then leave. And just… don't come back."

The hurt welling up in Dean's eyes and in his mind, flying over the bond, made Cas's heart ache more than it already did. It made him want to apologize and hug Dean like he was a wounded puppy. But he stood firm, almost glaring at Dean despite his poor puppy-dog eyes, waiting for whatever it was keeping Dean from being trustworthy to become less important than Cas. Whatever it was, it _was_ less important. Cas was Dean's friend, and so was Adam, and Bobby and Balthazar, and Cas would be damned if he let Dean leave without appreciating it.

"I'm going to get in shitload of trouble for this," Dean sighed. "Yes, Cas, let's talk. Preferably with pie and Balthazar and Bobby."

"No Balthazar," Cas said immediately, "but pie and Bobby, yes."

Both Bobby and Dean gave Cas a look, and Bobby sighed heavily, and the conversation he was going to have with Dean ultimately grew a lot longer. He could practically feel the lecture he was going to get.

"Castiel, you're such a stubborn ass," Bobby said. "I've got pie in the cabinet. Sit down, Dean, let's talk."

Bobby pulled out pie for them, and the three of them sat at the table in Bobby's kitchen. They just ate their pie for a second, and Cas was perfectly happy to continue to just eat his pie for longer, but finally Dean cleared his throat and sat up a bit straighter in his seat. His two slices of pie were gone, and he was reaching to cut himself a third. He hadn't said anything yet, but Cas could tell he was going to, so he finished his pie quickly and waited for him to get on with it.

"Castiel," he said slowly, "there is much I would like to tell you, most of which I can't, but some of which I will anyway."

"Yeah, uh, I've got a lot I wanna tell you too, man," he said. "Let's start with that Balthazar's been doing business with fucking demons, and that's why I'm pissed off at him."

"Yeah, I knew already," he said. He sighed heavily and looked up at Cas. Their eyes locked for a second. Cas tried to feel for the understanding, reassuring feeling underneath the stare that he knew had to be there, but Dean wasn't giving it out. He was tired, and he was upset, and he was kind of angry with Cas too. He didn't know what to feel, knowing Dean's original thoughts about Cas were slipping away just as Cas's thoughts of Dean were. "Cas, let's talk about that last. First, I want to tell you that the reason I am not allowed to see you as much is because my superior has told me I can't. I shouldn't even have stayed this long, but I will because it is stupid. I want to be you friend, and I want to help you, and I can't do that if I follow their stupid rules. So I'm going to tell them to, uh…"

"Shove 'em up their asses," Bobby supplied as he finished off his plate of pie too.

"Yes, uh, shove their rules up their asses," Dean said, nodding. "Thank you, Bobby. Anyway, I'm… I'm sorry for disappearing. If you need me, pray to me, okay? I don't know if I'm going to be able to stay and just talk like this all the time, but I'm not staying for just a minute and then leaving anymore, I swear."

"Okay," Cas said. He had been mad at Dean about this before, but hearing him explain it made him realize that it wasn't really his fault. He couldn't stay angry about it. "It's okay, Dean, I get it. What else do you want to talk about?"

Dean sighed. "I don't know. I just wanted to. I wanted…" He swallowed. "Well, is Adam angry with me? I suspect he is. I was—I did a shitty thing to him. Do you know if he's angry?"

"Yes," Cas said. "And I know what you did, and I'm pretty angry too. You know, I used to be able to feel it, like in my gut or something, that we could trust you. 'Cause of the bond. I don't feel it anymore."

Dean didn't look up at him for a long time after that. He stood up at one point in the next three minutes of awkward silence and pie-eating, and it looked like he was going to leave. Cas wanted to get up and beg him not to, but he just sat there and stared, waiting for Dean to make his move. The next move Dean made was to swallow hard again and shake his head, changing his mind about something. He sat down.

"I'm, um. I'm sorry. I will attempt to be more trustworthy," he said quietly. He looked up at him finally, and his green eyes sparkled in the prettiest way he'd ever seen something before. Green wasn't his favorite color, but looking at Dean's eyes, he was suddenly thinking about how he should probably rethink his favorite color decision. His favorite color should have been _Dean's-eyes-green._ Cas wondered if Dean had a favorite color. He wondered if it was _Cas's-eyes-blue. _"Anyway, uh, look. If they tell me that to stay alive, I have to kill Gabriel, or you two, or Balthazar, I won't. I couldn't. I'm just… just telling you."

"Thanks."

It was quiet for a second. It seemed that they hadn't had as much to talk about as they thought. They had exhausted really everything they had wanted to talk to each other back. All that was left was Balthazar, and that involved Bobby.

"All right, kids, you can stop staring at each other," Bobby said, rolling his eyes.

"I am older than you…" Dean said, frowning at Bobby slightly.

"Never mind. We've got actually important things to talk about."

"Right, actually, yes we do," Dean agreed, apparently forgetting about Bobby's _kids._ That was the first time he had ever called Dean _kid_, and it was just as entertaining as he could've hoped it would be. His eyes turned to Castiel, and he wanted to sigh, to roll his eyes out of this conversation about Balthazar, but he knew that it was important to them, especially if Dean was concerned about it too. So he just sat and waited for the lecture, but at first no lecture came. Just, simply, Dean said, "I don't think it is a very good idea that you two are arguing now."

"It's not," Bobby said, and that was the start of the lecture. One brief sentence of non-lecture, and now here it was going to descend into them endlessly pointing out everything he'd done wrong. "I understand you're upset with him"—_Okay, well, didn't expect understanding,_ Cas thought—"but you've really got to let it go. Things are heating up. I can tell, and if I can tell, you can definitely tell. And when shit hits the fan, you two had better be standing side-by-side, because you two're all you've got. Seems like you're the best the world's got."

"We're not," Castiel said, frowning slightly. "We are definitely not the best the whole world has got."

"Well, yeah, y'are, 'cause otherwise I don't think they'd be seeking you out for all this shit," he said. "I don't think they'd give you this guy to make sure you didn't ruin your potential."

Leave it to Bobby to make it sound like something that he should be proud of. He didn't know whether to be happy that Bobby always believed in him and twisted things to show how much that was true, or if he should actually be frustrated with him turning this to him in a way that made it seem like it was the indecent thing not to go through with all of this. More sighs and eye-rolls were imminent, but Castiel managed to hold them in.

"Bobby, we all know they gave me Dean because they have no other choice than to use me for whatever they're using me for, and he's to make sure I don't become more of a fuckup," he said, and he didn't even know why he said it, where the urge to spill that out came from, because normally he just bundled it up and let it out on his own or during a hunt. He never just let it slide out in a close, touchy-feely conversation with his best friend and his father-figure-type-guy. "You know I'm just—I'm just screwed up." Because he had already let the first part slide out, so that second part had to come out too.

And then Bobby and Dean were, inevitably, going to spew bullshit about how _hell no, he wasn't a fuckup _and _you are the most important man I know right now_ and _don't you ever say that about yourself,_ and it was all such fucking lies that he couldn't stand it, didn't want to stand it, and he was about to get up and walk away and lock himself in his room and refused to talk to Dean if he flew in or if Bobby picked the lock because he just so desperately didn't even want to be there and he really couldn't stand it, and—

Suddenly he was up on his feet, hauled by two strong hands, and arms were around him. Unexpected, pleasantly warm, strong arms, and the head of the body that owned the arms was a little bit above his normally but it was ducked down slightly, pulling Cas into an admittedly slightly uncomfortably hug, but it was okay because the owner of the arms and head and the hug didn't really know about this kind of thing. He didn't hug back at first, but then he just heard a quiet whisper slip out near his ear, just a simple, "Yeah, I know," and his arms went around Dean because now he was comforting the angel too, and it was all just a really uncomfortable mess for a second, but they didn't care. Neither of them cared. They didn't bother to care, didn't feel it in themselves to find the will to. They just were, just together, arms wrapped a bit too tightly, bodies pressed together a bit too closely, heads ducked together and their ears and cheeks and chins brushed necks and chins and cheeks and shoulders as they moved. Maybe the hug was a bit too long, but it was strong, and it was comforting, and it was warmth swimming through both of them, and really, right then, it was so much better to feel like one being, because they could feel each other's thoughts and feelings and everything within such close proximity and while they were both feeling so strongly. They found it a little hard to find whose self-loathing belonged to who, and whose desire to just live within the warmth was stronger, because one felt heavier, but maybe it was just weighed with more emotion and not more desire.

And then all of the sudden, it just stopped, because they were pulling away, both of them, and Cas wanted to draw himself back into the hug—he'd take a hug like that from anyone, he told himself, not just Dean, but maybe, admittedly, just Dean—but he didn't. Instead he met Dean's green eyes, and he didn't really know how long he stared up at those. Maybe it was longer than the hug. Maybe it wasn't. Dean's eyes glowed with respect and fondness, and that was all it took to convince Castiel that yeah, he was important somehow. Maybe was still a fuckup. He couldn't rid himself of that opinion entirely. But also, yeah, people needed him. People cared. And he remembered that right then, which honestly he should have done more often, but he just didn't.

Dean's eyes, Dean's stare—it helped.

Dean's arms, his hug, his chest too close to Castiel's. Dean's cheek up against his own, warm and a bit scratchy, in need of a shave, or maybe that was Cas's too, because he was definitely. He ran his hand over his face slightly, but not over the cheek that Dean's cheek touched, for fear of losing the sensation, that comforting brush that would anchor him for as long as he could remember it.

He caught himself. What was he doing? Why was he thinking so… stupidly?

He ran his hand over the cheek that Dean's touch, as if brushing it away, and immediately he regretted it, but he tried to brush that away too.

"The fight for Gabe is coming soon," Dean said, as if nothing had ever happened. "You must make up with Balthazar for it."

Bobby was speechless. One hundred percent, totally, completely speechless, for all of a suspicious three seconds, before snapping out of it and saying, "Yeah, ya really need to."

He looked between them. "No," he said. "He—_betrayed _us, and you can't spin it like I'm the bad guy. He left me, and he changed his fucking number, and now he can't even trust me enough to restrain from making deals with _demons._ No, I'm not—I'm not making up with him. _No._"

"Cas," Dean said reasonably. He was still in Cas's personal space, trying to catch his eyes, but he was unaffected, refusing to let them force him to make up with Balthazar. He would fight with him for Gabriel, but no, he would not make up with him. He didn't want to, he didn't feel it was right, and he didn't have to. He did not have to. "Please, just… please."

"No," he said again. "I won't."

"Come on, Cassie," Bobby said. For a moment, Cas was surprised that Bobby used _Cassie _on him in this situation. He didn't see why he called him that now. "It's the only chance you've got for Gabe." But that was it, maybe. His desperation to get Gabriel back was overwhelming him too. "You two will fight shitty together if you haven't made up."

"Well, I'll just go with Dean, then," he said, looking up at him.

"This is an all-hands-on-deck thing, Cas," Bobby said. "I've already decided I'm going when the time comes."

"I'm going to attempt to convince Adam to go," Dean said. "I will need him to, especially if I cannot come myself."

"Why wouldn't you be able to come?" Cas asked, looking up at him.

"Well, for one thing, I've just decided right now that I'm not waiting until later to get him out," he said. He smiled slightly at Cas, almost proudly. "We're breaking him out."

"We are?" Bobby said.

"Yes. Which is why it is imperative that you and Balthazar work together. I will be forced to wait until my superior gives me the clearing to get him if you do not," he said.

That was it. It felt like an empty threat, but Cas didn't care. Dean would _not_ threaten him with his brother.

He stepped away from him, almost stumbling away, letting the anger and upset take him over, put him on overdrive. He stomped to his room almost in a haze, gathering up the keys to the Impala and some money and throwing stuff in his bag. He felt the amulet Gabriel and Balthazar gave him bouncing against his chest, and he had half the mind the take it off and leave it there, but he didn't. He couldn't, not ever. Not even then.

He pushed past these thoughts and tried to think of where he could go. There were the hunters Bobby had mentioned before, the mother and daughter with their crazy smart, possibly stoner buddy that owned a roadhouse or something. He knew where they lived. He had almost gone before, to talk to them in person about finding Gabriel, but he hadn't ever done it.

Well, now was the perfect opportunity.

He went out the backdoor, avoiding Dean and Bobby. He could hear Dean behind him as he went out, or maybe that was Bobby but it felt like Dean. Or maybe Dean was just getting rapidly angrier. Either way, he didn't look back as he went around to the front to get to the Impala. The footsteps behind him disappeared, but when he finally got to the car, Dean was already in the passenger's seat.

"Wherever you're going, I'm going," he said. Cas sighed, aggravated. He got in the car without protest only because he could see Bobby at the front door, ready to run forward and stop them. He turned the key in the ignition and drove away from Bobby's quickly. "Where do you plan on going, Castiel?"

"So you're not calling me Cas right now?" he asked distantly.

"Sometimes I call you Castiel. I think I'll call you Castiel when I am angry with you," he said. As an afterthought, he added, "Castiel."

"You're angry with me."

"Rightfully so, I believe."

There was silence. Cas was out on another long road trip. He was beginning to get sick of all these road trips that weren't actually for cases.

"About six hours until we're at their roadhouse, I think," Cas said instead of actually responding to Dean's comment. "Are you staying for the whole time?"

"Yes."

Castiel highly doubted that Dean would stay put in that seat for the entire six hours, that he wouldn't fly off for a bit and show back up at the roadhouse some time later, but he wasn't going to complain about it until he actually took off. While he was there, next time, seemingly willing to keep Cas company the whole time, well, he would just appreciate that while he could. He'd appreciate Dean's good intentions.

"You really should make up with Balthazar," he said, looking over at Cas, his green eyes both insistent and pleading. Cas glanced over at him, their eyes locking for a moment before he turned them back toward the road. His heart had picked up; maybe it had to do with the little jerk because he'd gotten a little distracted, looking over at Dean, which had to be attributed to the fact that he was thinking about how much he didn't want to make up with Balthazar, surely.

"You really should go back to the angels before you ensure yourself a giant ass-chewing, but I'm not begging you to do that and you don't seem to be set on it," he said, "so I'm not set on making up with Balthazar, and I'd like you to stop begging me to."

"It's for Gabriel," he said. "I wouldn't keep asking you if that weren't true, Cas."

"Well—" He looked over at him. Dean was so utterly fucking _earnest._ He was telling every single damn ounce of the truth. "I'll…" He sighed heavily. "I'll think about it."

"Thank you."

* * *

Surprisingly, Dean did stay with him the entire time it took him to drive to the middle of Nebraska. They talked the entire time, sometimes about Balthazar, sometimes about Gabriel, sometimes about the angels, but sometimes they just talked. About Cas's favorite color, why humans picked out things like favorite numbers and colors and seasons. They talked for what seemed like forever about Dean's favorite siblings, about his attachment to Adam and this one angel he had been extremely attached to when they were younger angels, but they'd drifted apart. Castiel was very fascinated by Dean's relationship with this angel.

"His name is Samuel," Dean started, almost distantly. "He is an archangel. I have always been younger than him, being only a Seraph, but I felt like the older brother sometimes. Of course, in the beginning of our relationship, he was the one teaching me about humans and how to fly, but then as time went on, he got lost. So lost. He was not sure who his allegiance should be placed with. He didn't agree with a lot of the things the other archangels did, or their interpretation of our Father's wishes." He paused, thinking hard for a second. Then he went on. "It was a very dark time for him. I guided him through it, took care of him when he nearly got himself killed. Sometimes he could be very foolish about where he left his sword, which is the only thing that can kill him. Someone stabbed him with it, but luckily it wasn't too deeply, and he avoided death. The others were very angry with him at the time because he wasn't being very discreet about his allegiance issues, so I helped him. When he got better, he… left. I have not heard from him in… well, centuries, millennia even, but I have no doubt that he is alive."

"Why are you so sure?" Cas asked. It almost reminded him of when Balthazar went off to Stanford.

"Well, sometimes, over the angel radio, there's this static," he said. "Because we do not technically have real voices, it's like a sense that helps us tell who is speaking to us or who we are sending our messages to over the radio. And I feel like it is him that sometimes sends me the static."

They arrived at the roadhouse not long after the conversation about Samuel. There was a truck parked in the lot but other than that and a camper around the side, it looked closed. Castiel pulled them up to a parking spot and got out. He ducked his head down into the car and looked over at Dean. "You coming with me?"

"I may as well."

Dean got out of the car. Castiel looked up at the sign that read _Harvelle's Roadhouse._ He looked over at Dean and went into the place. Dean trailed behind him. Inside, it was very much a roadhouse. There were pool tables and tables for sitting and a bar. There was a guy with a mullet asleep on a pool table with a laptop on his chest and his hand circled around a beer. Castiel walked past him, looking around for the women that Bobby had described lived and worked at the roadhouse. The guy on the table must've been Ash.

Suddenly Dean said, "Cas!" and something pressed up against his back.

Castiel froze. "Oh God, please let that be a rifle."

The sound of a gun cocking. The person behind him, a woman, said, "No, I'm just real happy to see you. Don't move."

"Not moving, copy that," Cas said, holding his arms out slightly in a surrender way. He thought for a split second about where the rifle was, how he could get out. He was pretty sure whoever it was wouldn't shoot him, but he couldn't really be sure, and Dean didn't seem to be helping much. "You know, you should know something, miss. When you put a rifle on someone, you don't want to put it right against their back. Because it makes it real easy to do…" He turned around quickly and grabbed the gun from her and cocking it. "That."

Before he could think, the woman punched him and took the rifle back. Pain split through his face where she hit him, and he doubled over, clutching his nose. "_Dean!_ Come on, help me!" This was so ridiculous. "I can't see, can't even see," he muttered.

Another woman came in quickly. This one was older than the one that had the rifle pointed at him. She assessed the situation and quickly pointed a gun at Dean, who was moving forward with his hand in smiting position toward the younger woman.

"No, Dean, not like that!" he said quickly, and his hand dropped.

He looked up at him. "Well, what sort of help do you want, then, Castiel?" he said, irritated. "Want me to help bake a pie or something?"

His attempt at sarcasm, which was what Cas was pretty sure it was, wasn't very helpful right then.

"Castiel?" the older woman said, frowning at him slightly. "You ain't Castiel Novak, are you?"

"Yeah?" he said, not moving. "Yeah, that's me."

"Well, son of a bitch," she said, keeping her gun pointed at Dean.

"Mom, you know these guys?" the younger woman asked. It just came to Castiel that the younger one was Jo and the older one Ellen.

"Yeah, I know Castiel. One of Rachel Novak's boys," she said, and Jo's gun started to slowly lower away from Cas and to the floor. "Not the other one. Who's this? Doesn't look like one of your brothers."

"He's not. That's Dean, he's my friend," Cas explained quickly.

Ellen's gun lowered now too. She smiled quickly, easily, and laughed. "Hey," she said, "I'm Ellen. That's my daughter, Jo." Cas and Dean looked between them.

"Hey," Jo said quietly to them.

"Not gonna hit me again, are you?" Cas said to Jo.

She rolled her eyes. Their guns were set aside, and Ellen took to fussing over them like they were her own sons. She offered them drinks and pie, which Dean and Cas quickly said yes to, and Ellen got Cas a rag for his nose, which still really hurt, because damn, Jo could really punch someone.

"Thanks," Cas said. Dean sat across from him, eating both of their pies. Cas didn't really care. Pie sounded good, but he wasn't actually all that hungry. "So, Bobby said you guys and Ash could help find Gabe."

"Yeah, he's talked to us," Ellen said. "So what happened to looking for the demon? And where's your mom?"

"Gabriel will lead us to the demon," Dean spoke up.

Cas's head turned toward him. That was something he hadn't mentioned yet. "Wait, hang on. The demon that killed my dad? Gabe's with _that?_"

"Cas, please don't get angry," Dean said quickly, looking up from his pie. "I forgot to tell you. It's been very hectic for me, you know that."

"Not hectic enough that you shouldn't tell me that Gabriel is actually _with_ the demon!" he said.

"He is not with the demon," he said. "You will know more very, very soon. Please, for now, just trust me. Can you do that?"

He knew he could, so he just sighed huffily and looked down at the rag that Ellen had given him.

He could feel Ellen's eyes on them, looking between the two of them. "You remind me of an old married couple," she said.

Cas looked up at her with an eyebrow raised. "Uh—no. No, we're—no."

"Wasn't saying that," she said. "So, I assume Gabe's safe or you would be freaking out more than you are. So your mom, what happened to her?"

"Uh, do you want the long story or the shortened story?" Cas asked.

"Is there something in the middle?" she asked.

He shrugged. "She gave me the Impala and left. Told me to watch Balthazar and Gabriel. She called and visited sometimes. Got in a fight with Balthazar when he was accepted into Stanford. Balthy left, she got angry. Gabe dropped out. He was sixteen." He swallowed slightly. "Heard from her a month after all that. She left a voicemail. It just said, 'Hunt in Greenville, South Carolina,' and we just… haven't heard from her since."

"Was there a hunt in Greenville?" Dean asked.

Cas looked at him. Had it been anyone else, he would've gotten angry at them for the insensitivity of the question. Since it was Dean, he let it slide and smiled slightly, because he didn't want Dean to think he was angry. "Yeah," he said, "vengeful spirit."

"Hey, Ash is waking up," Jo called over to them.

"Good." Ellen looked down at the two of them. "Come on, let's do something about your brother."


	10. Chapter 10

**IMPORTANT: I'm going to be changing the title to something else after I post chapter eleven. I don't know what yet. I just don't feel like Broken and Whole is the title for this story. So if you look for this by searching for the title, make sure you read the notes of chapter eleven because they will say what the new name is.**

**So I guess this lines up with 2.06 _No Exit._ Only really because I love H. H. Holmes and even though I didn't really describe the case much because it follows exactly the plot of the actual episode, I didn't want to not mention this case at all. Because H. H. Holmes is seriously awesome. I think if he'd choose a place to haunt though, he'd pick his murder castle in Chicago. I think the only connection he has to Philadelphia is that he and his insurance fraud buddy Benjamin Pietzel set a place up there. I don't really know what. The only thing I know about his connection to Pietzel is that when he promised Marion Hedgepath money and didn't follow through, Hedgepath told people about the insurance shit he and Pietzel were doing, and so to cover it all up, he killed Benjamin and three of his kids and told his wife they were still alive and in Canada. Sam says in 2.06 that the total people he killed in his murder castle and just because could've been up to 100, but actually some people say it was over 200. No one knows because he was hanged for the murders of the Pietzels before anyone really asked about his murder castle shit.  
**

**Sorry for rambling. I have to do a report on this guy and he's actually really cool. In a serial killer way.**

**Anyway, yeah. So this basically is the pure definition of calm before the storm, except, of course, there's angsty shit in there between Balthazar and Cas, and Jo and Ellen, and Cas and his life. And also Destiel stuff, but don't get excited. They have a shit wave headed for them that's going to set them waaaaaay behind in terms of admitting their feelings and getting together.**

**So next chapter is when shit hits the fan, and then the chapter after that we _finally_ get Gabriel. Maybe even some Gabriel POV. Okay, yes, definitely Gabriel POV. Expect within the next five to six chapters for Sam to finally come. Samuel is Sam, by the way. Trust me, no one will call him Samuel, except, like, other angels and shit. And Gabriel will undoubtedly call him Sammo and Samsquatch.**

* * *

_Ellen looked down at the two of them. "Come on, let's do something about your brother."_

* * *

The major drawback in their plan to gather all the forces they could and barge right into Cold Oak, where Gabriel supposedly was, was that Dean didn't know _where Cold Oak was._ Ash was given everything Dean and Cas knew and was sent off to look for Cold Oak. Even though Cas was almost ninety percent sure that this guy was a drunken hunter freak, Jo and Ellen assured them, almost protectively, that he was a total genius. Jo got kind of mad when Cas seemed skeptical. Jo was cool. So was Ash, admittedly.

While Ash was doing his work, Dean and Cas spent time helping with the roadhouse. Dean actually came back the next morning like he promised, and he told Cas about what his superior said about him staying all the extra time. He was mad, but Dean went off anyway. They had to get this thing with Gabriel over quickly before his bosses got really, really mad. But until then, he said he'd come in as much as he actually could. So he showed up after Cas spent the night at the roadhouse, which was very homey and he would admit to liking it there as much as he liked it at Bobby's. Ellen was nice. She wasn't a parent figure to him like Bobby, and Jo seemed kind of pissed off by his very existence, but it was good there.

The best part was that he was fed copious amounts of pie, and Dean actually told him: "If I am ever not here when you're eating pie, just pray to me because I like this pie."

Whenever Dean asked, they were sat down, given pie, and then told to get back on their asses and help. If Cas stayed too long, he was sure he would start to lose his abs to this. He was being _spoiled_ like a little kid, and it was honestly great. Ellen talked sometimes over the next two days about how she knew Rachel Novak, and how he might not remember but he'd been there before but it'd gone through some renovations so he most likely wouldn't remember. She said how his mom came a lot without them too. She didn't seem altogether fond of Rachel, but she said that she trusted her, and her husband, Bill, hunted with Rachel a lot before he died. Cas apologized for his death. Ellen shook her head and told him to just not talk about it in front of Jo.

Ash hardly ever crawled out of his room upstairs at the roadhouse, the sign on his door always saying _Dr. Badass is in_, working on likely both getting high and finding Gabriel. Hell, maybe that was how he worked to find Gabriel: he got high.

On the second day, Jo and Ellen became suspicious of Dean. They didn't know about he came and went because they didn't know about angels, and it would be a bit more complicated than just flashing his wings and eyes to convince them. Cas had only believed Dean back in the barn when he had done that because of the bond. It wasn't really that long ago, just a few weeks or so, and it didn't feel like any longer than that. But Cas had grown so close to Dean, so dependent on him showing up when he said he would, so perceptive of his emotions and what some of them meant and how some were frustratingly vague in his mind and hard to understand.

He thought for the rest of the day about trying to find ways to convince him, but in the end the only way was to show them his wings and hope for the best.

He was scared that Dean would leave. He loved having him there every time he woke up, just like he promised. He was so unused to having him actually do that anymore, ever since his superior had apparently cracked down on Dean about doing as he was told. As it turned out, he was rather opposed to doing what he was told.

He liked Dean, cared about him a lot, and sometimes he thought about all the things he'd written off. The hug was a major one, because it was undeniable that he hadn't gotten a little _too_comfortable in Dean's arms. Their staring, the little feelings he could that he could easily look around and forget, but every once in a while throughout those forty-eight hours, they reemerged, presenting themselves and waving flags. Generally this happened when Dean was in front of him and the bond was heavy with Dean's comfort around him or his trust and care.

He came to the horrible realization on the dawn of the third day at the roadhouse, the day that they would tell Ellen and Jo about Dean's angelic existence, the day that could easily go wrong and send Dean flying away for a while for weird, Deanlike reasons, that maybe… Yeah, no, definitely, he had a bit of a crush on Dean, and this was a huge problem. This was such a big problem for Castiel that when he heard Dean asking to come in on the other side of the door, he panicked and said, "No."

"No?" Dean said. Cas could practically feel the frown that the angel was surely wearing on the other side of the door. "Why not?"

"I'm, um… naked," he said, because it was the only thing he could think of that would warrant any wish for Dean to stay out of his room. He wanted to sort this out alone, to assure himself that Dean was totally just his friend, like a brother or something, but it was gross to think of him as a brother because he _liked him_, and when he heard Dean's voice he felt heat inside him, in his chest, a little warmth that spread up to his ears and then through his face. _Dean—_this awesome, crazy, nice, badass, hot guy, this _angel_, with pretty green eyes and ridiculously cool wings he couldn't even see and the power to teleport and a mind-bond with him that could probably read him even if he didn't have the bond just because he really understood him. _Dean._

_Dean._

"Naked?" Dean said. "Why?"

"Because of… of really… things. Really, really… really manly things," he got out, and oh God he could feel how badly he was blushing.

It hit him and he blushed even more.

_Really manly things? What the hell?_

"Um."

"Okay, I'm dressed now, just come in," Cas said quickly to avoid having to explain that.

Dean came in, and to Cas's surprise, his cheeks were tinted red too. And, true to character, he said, almost obliviously, "I can almost taste your embarrassment, Castiel."

"Yes. Well." He shrugged slightly. "Yeah. So, uh, hey, you're here."

He tried to block off the newfound thoughts about Dean, but he couldn't. He didn't know how to just put a wall up and separate these feelings from what he knew Dean could reach in his mind from this close proximity. He stepped away from him, to the other side of his room. He pretended to fiddle with something in his bag, trying to keep all his thoughts away from him.

_Just forget it,_ he told himself. _It's ridiculous._

Of course he didn't like Dean. Of course he didn't, and even if he did, all of his feelings for Dean were pretty twisted by the bond, so that had to be why. It wasn't real. He would admit that he wanted it to be real, but he knew it wasn't, so he told himself to drop it, and although he couldn't outright just let it slide by after only just discovering it, he knew he'd done it before and would eventually get on, even if he was around Dean all the time and didn't want to stop being around Dean.

Okay. Maybe it would be a little complicated, but hey, he'd dealt with worse.

"Castiel?" Dean said slowly, probably trying to sort through the mass confusion that was Cas's thoughts. Actually, he knew he was because normally Dean didn't say _Castiel._ He liked when Dean called him Cas. He liked when everyone called him Cas. Of course, _Cassie_ was special and reserved for Gabriel, Balthazar, and occasionally Bobby, not even Dean—that would be weird, it was like a family thing—so he couldn't really compared _Cas_ to that, but he liked it more than his full name.

"Yeah?" he said, glad his thoughts about his name were probably clouding up and pushing away at his thoughts about his feelings. "Sorry, uh, let's go tell the others about, you know, your wings and shit."

"All right… Should I just show them to them?" he said.

He nodded. "I'll do the rest of the talking."

"Okay."

They left Cas's room, walking downstairs to the roadhouse. Ellen, Jo, and Ash were already up. Ellen and Jo were preparing for opening. Dean thought of the many hunters that passed through to eat, to talk about cases, to simply check up on Jo and Ellen or something, to say hi and stuff to these old friends of theirs. That was what Cas wanted to do, he decided. If he didn't see Ellen, Jo, and Ash a lot anyway, if he got close enough to them, he wanted to just check up. Just drive up in the Impala if he was within a couple hours and say hey and eat some pie and talk to Ash about what he was looking into and Jo about guns and to Ellen about brother problems or something.

He could easily see himself developing a little hunting family in this roadhouse. This place was, honestly, the shit. Hunter _heaven._ Sure, there wouldn't really be anyone to take home here. These were all hunters, men and women who knew their shit and would not be swept off their feet by Castiel Novak's mysterious charm and smile. But damn, there was the poker, the pool, Ash to consult with, Ellen to feel mothered by, and Jo to just generally talk to. Good food, good drinks, good company. Fuck, good _everything._

The roadhouse wasn't just hunter heaven—it was Castiel heaven.

He approached the three of them. Ash was eating breakfast while Ellen and Jo set chairs up. He looked tired but seemed like he didn't even notice his own exhaustion.

"Morning," Jo greeted them.

"Morning," Cas said, sitting down at the bar, facing Ellen and Jo as they worked. Dean stood awkwardly next to him, unsure of what to do. "So, look, there's something we haven't told you. It's not bad, before you get worked up or anything. Actually, it's really good. Beneficial and all." He didn't even know what he was rambling on about.

The three of them looked up at him. "What?" Ellen said, skillfully keeping the suspicion out of her voice. He knew she was wary of Dean, even if she did trust Cas.

He looked up at the angel standing over him. "Do your thing."

Dean nodded and stepped into a fairly clear space of the roadhouse. The wings suddenly stretched out, their shadows the only thing he could see. They were large and full, beautiful even if he could only see the shadows, radiating a power that he felt strongly, more so than Jo, Ellen, and Ash would. His green eyes got a light, icy blue color and they glowed, brighter than anything he'd ever seen. It was exactly what he'd seen in the bar, but… more magnificent. Like maybe Dean's wings had been molting or something when he'd first seen them, but now they were back in full again, and… God. Wow.

He seemed to flex them, almost fucking showing off, before they disappeared and his eyes went back to being green and _fuck,_ he'd never get used to that.

"What the hell?" Jo said. Cas turned back and realized she'd gotten a gun out.

"No, no, no!" he said, stepping between the gun and Dean. "Nooo, hang on, listen to us. Just wait a second there, Jo. You've got the entirely wrong idea. He's an angel." He could see how they were intimidated, but damn, if that wasn't the most thing they'd ever seen then they had to have seen God Himself descending to give them a high-five or something.

"There's no such thing as an angel," Ellen said carefully, not yet pulling out a gun but stepping away from Dean, her eyes on him closely.

"There could be," Ash said, utterly transfixed by Dean now. "I've seen… a lot, looking for Gabriel."

"Yeah," Cas said. He sighed. "Look, we've got this whole thing going on. I'm not going to explain it in full, but basically, I trust him with literally everything in me. If you trust me, you have to trust him too. And if you want him to leave now, I leave too."

Although she didn't seem any less nervous about Dean's presence, Ellen said, "Castiel Novak, you are nothing short of a fucking _drama queen._" To say the least, this caught Cas off guard. "We're not gonna ask you two to leave. This is just—a little farfetched. Demons, of course. Angels? I don't know."

"Mom!" Jo said, looking at her incredulously. "You can't be serious."

Ellen looked at her daughter, and then at Ash. "What have you found, Ash?"

"Uh, well, you know," he said, "angelic things. I'm not saying he is or isn't. I'm just saying we both know he's not a demon or a monster we know because we've got a ton of shit in the walls and Cas isn't a monster or demon, so why freak out?"

Jo's gun lowered slightly, and Cas thanked Ash silently for his reasoning. He glanced over at him and tried to convey his gratefulness as well as he could without saying it out loud. Ash just shrugged slightly and went back to his food, apparently bored now by it all, Dean's intrigue having faded for him. Or maybe he was just _really _tired, and honestly, he looked it.

Ellen was the first one to speak after that, and all she did was nod and say, "Got anything more on Gabriel?" She seemed to accept that this was the truth from Ash, but she didn't get very close to Dean, even after he came over to Cas and stood next to him, harmless to all of them. Of course, he was actually a really badass angel, but he would never hurt the four of them. So, basically, harmless.

"No, but it's getting there, I think," Ash said distractedly. He stood up, his breakfast gone. "I'm gonna pass out."

He walked out of the room. Cas wondered if he made it back to his room before passing out.

Ellen and Jo continued getting the roadhouse ready, avoiding Dean and Cas, so they went over to a table to get out of their way.

"This isn't about them, but I have to go," Dean told him after a quiet second in each other's presence.

"For how long?" Cas said, looking up at him from the spot on the table he was staring at as he thought.

He shrugged, sighing slightly. "I don't know, Cas," he said. He went quiet for a second, thinking seemingly deeply. When his thought was over, he looked up at him again. "I just have to talk to my superiors. They're undoubtedly angry."

"Well, yeah." _Because of me._ "So can you come back, like, tomorrow? Or the next day?"

"I will check in."

They both looked down at the table. Cas didn't really know what Dean was thinking about, other than it was something that it was making him feel excessive amounts of frustration, to the point where Cas wanted to make all of that stop for him. What Cas thought about, other than that, was how he finally got Dean back for a while, he had a great place to stay, more progress on finding Gabriel was being made than since he was first lost, and now Dean was leaving. He couldn't help but think about how things were surely going to go downhill.

"Pray to me, if things go wrong, okay?" Dean said, looking up at him. His eyes were serious and worried, so Cas nodded quickly, but it didn't relieve any of that from Dean's eyes. He let out a little puff of breath, maybe irritation. "I wish I didn't have to go." He stood up. "Please call Balthazar." And then he was gone, flying away to wherever he flew to, and Cas was left sitting at his table in the roadhouse, feeling alone even with Ellen and Jo there.

He didn't like how distant Dean's emotions were now that he wasn't next to him.

"Where did Dean go?" Ellen asked.

"Heaven, I think," he said. He stood up. "Is there anything I can do to help?" Really, he should've been helping her anyway, but now that he didn't have Dean to distract him, he wanted something to _do._

* * *

Small amounts of progress were made. Ash told them about all these omens, and Cas called Bobby about each one. Bobby said he would send other hunters out to check on the omens. He told Cas to stay put, and even though he wanted to be out doing something, he did as he was told, which seemed to surprise the older man. He was only doing it because he, admittedly, didn't want to go on these cases without backup. A demon case wasn't the type you went out on alone.

Balthazar showed up two days after Dean left. He was welcomed happily by Ellen, fed pie or whatever else he wanted in great amounts until his presence was broken in and he was expected to help the three of them getting the roadhouse ready and cleaning up after it closed, or sometimes sending food out to Ash or checking up on him. Cas liked doing this though, so most of the time Balthazar went and found Cas already sitting in his room and talking to him about what he was learning about Gabriel.

Ash was interesting. He was funny, and honestly brilliant, though he looked like nothing more than a Lynyrd Skynyrd roadie. He already knew a ton about angels, more than even Cas really knew.

"They have to have permission to take up a vessel," he told him. "Demons can go in and just fuck everything up, but angels have to ask to wreck you. And they don't have souls, but you probably already know that, with that whole head thing you've got going on with Dean"—and of course, he had already learned a lot about the grace-and-soul bond without even really having to ask Cas—"but anyway, they've got grace, you know. It's what makes them angels. Bluish stuff, kinda like demon smoke. Their wings and true forms, like for demons', are on different plains than what we are. So Dean's wings could've smacked us all in the face a billion times and we don't know it. Pretty asocial, really. Haven't poked their heads out too much in centuries."

He didn't have as much on Gabriel, but he said to find Gabriel he needed to learn about these angels, see if he could work out parts of their plans. He had already built something to monitor any signs of the demon that killed their dad and had Gabe, and he had found a lot of things from it, including omens from his lackeys, but the exact whereabouts of the demon that supposedly had yellow eyes instead of black wasn't pinpointed yet.

He was the smartest son of a bitch Cas was sure he'd ever meet, and he regretted ever thinking he was just some weird motherfucker passed out on the roadhouse pool table every day, clutching a bottle of beer.

He and Balthazar didn't talk. They passed each other. It was awkward, but there was no reason to talk. They glanced when they were in the roadhouse, mostly accidentally. Cas would glare at the floor whenever Ellen tried to get them to talk, or when Jo would get into conversation with Balthazar and seem to be enjoying it more than she ever did talking to him.

But he knew that these three wouldn't just become his family; Balthazar could and would easily get along with them, would befriend them, would work his way into the little system that the roadhouse life had to offer. It felt like he was stealing it from Cas though, but really, he knew it was just his jealousy making him think like this. It was so stupid of him. Balthazar was his brother and he had every right to care about and be cared about by these people. There was no reason for him wanting him to be unhappy. It was all unnecessary angst, but he couldn't find it in himself to forgive his brother yet.

He did talk to him, though, finally. Well, Balthazar started the conversation, but it wasn't like he really stopped it from happening.

"I'm sorry," he said, and his voice was so upset and serious and apologetic that Cas looked up to see if his face matched, and sure enough, it did.

"Yeah," was all he said at first thought, meaning to shut down the conversation, to ignore those eyes that were unintentionally the greatest puppy-dog eyes he'd ever had lain on him, but he couldn't, because damn it, he knew it was all stupid and selfish and pointless, and as much as he wanted some sort of payback, some sort of thing to make Balthazar understand what he'd done and how it had made Castiel suffer, he knew that Balthazar already did. He understood. He was smart.

Damn it, what was he even doing?

"I know," he said. "I…" He sighed. "I forgive you, Balthy." He was glad Ellen and Jo weren't up at the bar to hear him. "You did some really shitty stuff, but I know you get that, and I shouldn't have let this whole thing drag out so long. I'm sorry too."

"It's okay, Cassie," he said, shaking his head. "I deserved it. It was my punishment, because I really did a horrible thing."

So after that they just stopped being angry with each other. They both relayed what was found out by them or Ellen or other hunters or Ash to Bobby together. Thought Ash was the brilliant one, figuring the bulk of this stuff out, Bobby was their go-to guy to get all the information pieced together into either something coherent enough to run off of, or something to feed to ash so he could work the rest out from it.

They found a case, because they were bored, and Dean hadn't checked in, and Ash hadn't found anything significant. Jo and Ellen ended up in an argument about whether or not Jo should start hunting. Ellen said no, Jo said yes, and while Cas felt like he was invading, he didn't want to bring attention to himself by leaving. Balthazar seemed to be feeling the same, so they awkwardly stood in the doorway heading into the roadhouse, coming back from getting something other than roadhouse food after finding the case.

"I am your mother! I don't have to be reasonable!" Ellen said as they walked around the bar.

"You can't keep me here!" Jo shouted back, following her.

"Oh, don't you bet on that, sweetie," she said, voice full of her anger.

"What are you going to do? Chain me up in the basement?" Jo said, moving around her mother so she was facing her.

"You know what, you've had worse ideas that that recently," she said. "Hey, you don't want to stay, don't stay. Go back to school!"

"I didn't belong there! I was a freak with a knife collection!"

Cas felt more and more like he was intruding on this.

"Yeah, but getting yourself killed on some dusty back road—that's where you belong?" The women stared at each other for a second, before Ellen turned back to them. "Guys, bad time."

Cas nodded slightly and he heard Balthazar said quietly behind him, "Yes, ma'am."

"Yeah, we rarely drink before ten anyway," Cas said, preparing to go back and leave. They had their stuff in the Impala anyway, because they'd planned on not coming back until the case was over and had told Ellen so, but they wanted to talk to Ash before they left. Cas turned to leave, Balthazar following suit.

"Wait," Jo spoke up. She marched around Ellen and closer to the brothers. "I wanna know what they think about this."

A little family came in, all of them wearing _Nebraska__ is for Lovers_ t-shirts. Definitely not hunters, definitely didn't know Ellen and Jo.

"I don't care what they think!" Ellen said.

"Are you guys open?" the dad of the family said awkwardly.

Jo turned to look at the dad, a frown on her face. "No!" she said, at the same time as Ellen shouted, "Yes!"

The mom and the dad looked at each other. "We'll just… check out the Arby's down the road…" the dad said before leaving with an awkward smile on his face, caring one of their children out with him.

The phone rang. Jo and Ellen both glared at each other, neither of them getting it. Balthazar and Cas looked at each other, not really sure what to do. They couldn't just walk out now. Finally Ellen walked back around the bar and picked it up. "Harvelle's," she said. "Yeah, Preacher."

Jo walked over to them, shoving a folder toward Cas. "Three weeks ago a young girl disappears from a Philadelphia apartment," she said. Her voice was still shaky from the argument. Cas looked at her, slightly confused. "Take the folder, it won't bite."

"No, but your mom might," he said, glancing over at Ellen.

She pushed the folder closer, insistently, her lips pinched together. Cas took the folder a bit exaggeratedly and looked through it. "And this girl wasn't the first. Over the past eighty years six women have vanished. All from the same building, all young blondes. Only happens every decade or two so cops never eyeball the pattern. So we're either dealing with one very old serial killer, or—"

The folder was impressive. "Who put this together? Ash?" Cas said, looking up at her.

She shook her head, a ghost of a smile appearing on her face. "I did it myself."

"Hmm." He didn't expect that. Yeah, Jo wasn't stupid, but she wasn't experienced in hunting things either.

"I gotta admit," Balthazar said next to him. "We've hit the road for less."

"What about my case?" Cas said.

"Your case is shit," he said. "One guy disappears, so what. This has got six."

"Good!" Ellen said, her phone call over with. "You like the case so much, you take it."

"Mom," Jo said in protest.

"Joanna Beth, this family has lost enough," she said. "I won't lose you too." She looked up at Cas and Balthazar, and then back at Jo. "I just won't."

And that was that.

* * *

They did the case. Jo showed up, and almost got herself killed, but all in all did a pretty good job. As it turned out, the killer was the ghost of H. H. Holmes, America's first serial killer. The only reason Jo lived was because he was a major psychopath and liked to keep his victims alive for a while, which he did for his victims in his Chicago "murder castle."

Unfortunately, Ash told Ellen that Jo left, and since Cas and Balthazar lied to her about that, she was pretty pissed. When Holmes or Mudgett or Howard, or whatever the guy's last name was, took Jo, Ellen called, and Cas had to tell her. So she flew out to Philadelphia. By the time she got there, Jo was back, safe and sound, but Ellen was _pissed._

They had to drive her all the way back to the roadhouse in fucking _Nebraska_, which was a damn long trip, and they'd have to stop at a motel on the way. The first hour was silent and boring as hell. Any attempt at conversation resulted in Ellen and Jo somehow starting to argue, so eventually they learned not to talk. Balthazar was next to Jo in the backseat, and he really wished he was up front with Cas so they could talk, but Ellen being next to Jo right then was the last thing they wanted to make happen.

Finally, Cas couldn't stand it anymore. He put on a smile and said jokingly, "Boy, you, uh, really weren't joking about flying out, were you?"

It seemed like she didn't even hear him.

He looked back out at the road and puffed out his cheeks, letting out a quiet breath. "How about we listen to some music?" he said, leaning forward and turning music on. All that got out was _You're as cold as ice_ before Ellen leaned forward and turned it off. There was pause. He glanced back at Balthazar, not turning his head much. "This is gonna be a long drive," he said, almost matter-of-factly.

By the time they _finally_ got back to the roadhouse the next day, Cas was ready to head to his room and crash. Ellen was still beyond angry, and she all but dragged Jo back in by her elbow. Cas and Balthazar followed them in there.

"Ellen," Cas said quickly, wanting to relieve some of the trouble that Jo was going to get in. "This is my fault. Okay? I lied to you and I'm sorry. But Jo did good out there and I think her dad would be proud."

He could see a little smile come onto Jo's face, but before it had time to grow, Ellen snapped, "Don't you dare say that. Not you. I need a moment with my daughter. Alone."

Cas frowned, almost feeling hurt. When Ellen had called Cas before, she had said something about Novaks promising things to her and not going through with it, but it was quick and they were in the middle of the case, so he didn't think much of it. She had welcomed him and Balthazar, him for almost a week now. Did he do something wrong? Did he fuck up this place too, this relationship he was forming?

The brothers left the roadhouse and went back out to the Impala, leaning against it.

"What do you think that was about?" Cas asked, searching for a beer or something, but there was nothing. He sighed slightly.

"I don't know. Did you say anything, or did I say something…?" he said, looking up at him.

He shook his head. "I don't think so. Fuck, I hope we didn't screw this up. I love this place, you know?" he said. "I love… I love it. I don't want to mess this up."

"Neither do I, Cassie," he said gently. He looked at his younger brother. He knew that Balthazar could tell how horrible he would feel if they lost this, this little haven of theirs. It would be great to have Bobby's if they were nearer to South Dakota and the roadhouse when nearer to Nebraska. Hell, and if they were close to Kansas for whatever reason, there was the Missouri Moseley he and Gabe went to sometimes. She always loved when they visited, and they had spent nights there before. It wasn't much fun to be in Lawrence, but as long as they didn't think about the fact that they were in Lawrence, just thought about being at Missouri's, it didn't even matter.

"So what are we doing after this?" Balthazar asked. "Another case, or…?"

"I don't know. I was thinking just stay here for a day, look for another, help Ash and Jo and Ellen," he said. "Dunno if they're even gonna let us stay though, so it might be a good thing we packed all our shit up before this case."

"Yeah."

They sat in silence for a second, waiting to hear what happened next. Suddenly, Jo burst out of the roadhouse, walking quickly, hair flying out behind her. Cas went over and walked next to her. "That bad, huh?" he said.

"Not right now," she said in a tight voice.

"What happened?" he said, reaching his hand out to touch her shoulder. "Hey, talk to me."

"Get off me!" she snapped, turning to face hi. They both stopped walking.

"Sorry," he said, knowing that if they came back, it had better be after a couple days, just long enough for all the tension to die down. Or maybe he just wanted to leave because he didn't want to hear why they suddenly hated him, because surely they did. "See you around." He turned to leave.

"Cas," she said as he walked away. He turned back to her. She started walking toward him now. "Turns out my dad had a partner on his last hunt. Funny, he usually worked alone, and so did this partner of his. But I guess my father figured he could trust her." Her lips pursed a little. Cas had no clue where this was going. She smiled one of those horrible, bitter smiles. "Mistake. Woman screwed up, got my dad killed."

"What does this have to do—"

"It was your mother, Cas," she said, her voice rising just a little for a second.

"What?" he said quietly.

"Why do you think Rachel never came back?" she said. "Never told you about us? 'Cause she couldn't look my mom in the eye after that. That's why."

"Jo—" Cas started, wanting to list off a million reasons why that wasn't his fault, why he was done with his mom, why he and his mom were so unalike in so many ways, but she cut him off, and he wasn't really sure what he'd have said anyway.

"Just…" Her voice was painfully calm. It hurt, cut Cas deep. "Just get out of here. Please, just… leave." She turned and walked away from him.

He got in the car quickly. As much as he wanted to stay, he needed to get away after that. He needed to get far, far away from the roadhouse and forget about it, because if he pretended like he never went there, that he'd only talked to Ash, that rejection, the pushing away, wouldn't hurt so badly. Balthazar got in the passenger's seat, seeming to sense his desperation to move.

"I can drive," he said.

"I need to drive," Cas told him.

So they drove. They drove away from that roadhouse, away from the town, away from the state. They drove without stopping for hours, talking about little things like Bobby's house and things they remembered Gabriel doing and that time they caught him making out with the high school girl behind the junior high.

They drove so fucking far away, except not far enough. Pretty soon they were on the edge of South Dakota, and Cas just got it to his head that he was heading to Bobby's, which he was okay with. He didn't want to do another case. He couldn't think about it.

_Please come,_ he prayed to Dean after a few hours talking to Balthazar. _I want someone to talk to. Someone other than Balthazar. Fuck it, I just want to talk to you. I'm not in danger or anything. But I guess you'd be able to sense if I was. Just… please come._

He didn't come. Cas wasn't even sure if he did it right.

"Fuck Mom," he said suddenly as they edged closer and closer to Sioux Falls. "Fuck Mom and her ability to screw up our lives even now when she's probably fucking dead."

Balthazar looked over at him. "Cas," he said reasonably. "This isn't her fault. This isn't ours either. Jo is just upset. Give her time to cool down and realize that we aren't the reason her dad died."

"If the demon that killed Dad had three sons, would you want to be anywhere near them?" he said.

"If the demon that killed Dad had three sons, they'd all be demons," he countered.

"Yeah, well, whatever."

He couldn't get it out of his head. _You promise. That is not the first time I've heard that from a Novak. … Don't you dare say that. Not you. …Woman screwed up, got my dad killed. It was your mother. … Just… just get out of here. Please, just leave._

He couldn't have this one thing. Of course not.

They drove the rest of the way back to Sioux Falls in silence.

* * *

**Also: I have zero, _zero_, intentions to kill of Ellen, Ash, or Jo. Just so you know. I decided this chapter that I love them too much and their death is unnecessary. I realize that they died on the show because the writers thought the show would end after season 5 and they were killing off everyone around the boys, but this isn't going to end after season 5 and those three are just too great.**

**Another also: I ship Dean/Jo, which in this fic could translate to Cas/Jo or maybe Dean/Jo? I don't know. I might not make them get together at all, because I also like brother-sister dynamics between them, and I don't want them to ruin friendships or make anything awkward just to fill my shipping needs. But be aware that there could be brief Cas/Jo or Dean/Jo, as well as in the future there could be various other girls hooking up with all the guys. And yeah, there might be a little pizza man time between Meg and Dean or Meg and Cas. But there won't be excessive random hookups because this is a destiel/sabriel fanfic. So there won't be random Amelias or Aprils or anything. Maybe Lisa. Maybe.  
**

****IMPORTANT IN CASE YOU DIDN'T READ IT IN THE BEGINNING: I'm going to be changing the title to something else after I post chapter eleven. I don't know what yet. I just don't feel like Broken and Whole is the title for this story. So if you look for this by searching for the title, make sure you read the notes of chapter eleven because they will say what the new name is.****


	11. Chapter 11

**So I'm not changing the title.**

**Also, I won't be able to update much until November is over because I'm doing NaNoWriMo so getting my NaNo words done is my priority.**

* * *

_They drove the rest of the way back to Sioux Falls in silence._

_…_

Cas went to his room at Bobby's almost immediately, but he knew that Balthazar told Bobby about what happened from experience with them conspiring about him without his knowing. He was still kind of frustrated about their initial distrust of Dean, but it was in the past and he didn't need to think about it anymore. The only thing about Dean he needed to be thinking of was that he wasn't answering prayers as he promised, and he wasn't checking in. He didn't sense any danger in the future for him. He didn't sense much of anything, except the occasional apologetic flare that he couldn't help but feel was directed straight at him.

He did not sleep well. He didn't know how he could, with everything that was going on. He was worried about Dean, he was upset about Ellen and Jo, and he was scared for Gabriel. Every growing second seemed to make it worse. He hadn't felt this cared about his little brother since the very beginning, and it was absolutely horrible.

He tried to talk about it to Balthazar, but all he did was nod slightly and say, "Yeah, I feel the same," which wasn't helpful. He didn't know what he wanted from him, but that wasn't it.

He and Bobby talked about the things they'd relayed to him about Gabriel, and he skillfully avoided anything he knew would turn into talking about what happened at the roadhouse, between him and Jo. He wanted badly to ask him what he really thought about Rachel, if he thought she was alive. He wanted to hear someone else say if he really should be mad at her, if he should be upset if she was dead. But he couldn't bring himself to start the conversation with Bobby.

He talked to Balthazar about Gabriel and Dean and Adam and everything new in their lives, although they both skated around the topic of the roadhouse of course. Their conversation about Dean ended abruptly when his brother asked if there was anything going on between them, and it moved quickly to Gabriel after he said, dismissively, that no, there wasn't, and no, there never would be.

It was, all in all, a boring, surprisingly tiring day.

…

The next day was much less so. It started off with the best phone call he'd gotten in a long, long time. Of course, he didn't really get it; Bobby was the one who did, but he was told about it by Balthazar. He stormed into his room early in the morning, chanting his name excitedly. He was forced to wake up. He did, and slowly sat up, rubbing his eyes and sending an irritated glare at his brother. It was cold in the room, so he drew the blanket up around him tightly.

"What?" he muttered tiredly. "Unless there are a thousand angels or a thousand demons or both outside the house right now, I want to go back to sleep for another hour or two."

"Well, too bad," he said, "it's better than that."

"I'd hope so," Cas said. "I really don't want to deal with a thousand or two fuckfaces."

"No, that'd be horrible," Balthazar agreed, nodding, "but can you please stop thinking about fuckfaces for a second so I can tell you about this? Ash called!"

Cas felt a lot more awake than he did a second ago. "He did? What did he say? Did he say anything about Gabe?"

"Yeah, of course he did, you major asshole," he said, rolling his eyes. "Why else would I be this excited about telling you Ash called?"

He grinned ear to ear at his younger and stood up, blanket around his shoulders coming with him and all. He hugged him tightly and then rushed him out so he could get properly dressed. Then he burst out of his room again and went to find him.

"So what did he say exactly?" Cas asked when he found Bobby and Balthazar both in Bobby's living room, waiting for him. "Exact as you can."

"He said that he couldn't tell us much over the phone," Bobby started, "but that he's got enough on Gabriel that we need to get our asses over there right now."

He grinned impossibly wider than he already was. They were so close to finding him that he didn't want to wait another second. Any more time wasted would feel like he was actually dying. He needed his brother back. He needed him back desperately.

"Okay, should I call Dean? I'm not driving all the way down to the roadhouse. I don't think I can," he said excitedly, almost overwhelmed with his excitement. He didn't wait for an answer. Instead, he went to another room and prayed, less sadly or unhappily than before when he'd prayed. Instead he waved his arms around, unsure really what he was supposed to do for this. Before he'd just thought of or said aloud what he needed of Dean, but now he was too happy to think.

"Hey, man," he started, which wasn't the greatest start to a prayer. "Uh, and by 'man,' I mean Dean, so whoever the prayer police is that traffics all these things to the right angels, send this message to Dean please. Anyway, uh, we need you here. It's about you-know-who, and it's really good news, which you can probably tell from how happy I am. So yeah. Get down here before I die of happiness."

He went back into the living room and waited for Dean. He wasn't sure if he expected him to come as soon as he did, but he was damn glad when it happened. He came in a little flutter of wings. Cas stood up again, smiling at the green-eyed angel. "Hey! Guess what?"

"I did not come because of your prayer," Dean said gently. "I'm sorry. I came because you're in a lot of danger, and I don't want you to leave this place unless I am with you or Adam is. Do you understand? I will be extremely angry with you if you go anywhere alone. I have warded this place with magic but it won't last long. I can't stay to place anything more effective up, though."

Cas frowned at him. "Okay, then, I need you to accompany us to the roadhouse," he said. "It's really important, Dean."

He sighed and shook his head. "Unfortunately, Cas, I don't have time," he said. He looked at him sympathetically. He could clearly see that Dean wanted to help him, so he should've. It made him angry that he wouldn't, even though he didn't know that Gabriel had been found yet. "I can tell from your emotions that it's likely about Gabriel, and that he's been found. You will have to wait until tomorrow to go anywhere for him."

"No," Cas said. "We'll ask Adam."

"You need me too," he said, "and I can't go today. Gabe will be fine for one more day."

"Maybe he won't be!" he said, now glaring at him, unable to hold back his anger directed wholly at Dean. "I've trusted you this whole time because you said you'd get Gabe back for me, and it's not even you that brought me the news of where he is. You've been useless to us about Gabe, and now you won't even take us there." He couldn't keep himself from saying these things. He was too angry at Dean. "Balth, pray to Adam."

He did as he was told, maybe a bit intimidated by Castiel's anger. He had always, always stuck up for Dean, and now suddenly he was yelling at him like he'd never cared about him. He knew it was all just irrational anger, that he really shouldn't be trying to piss off their greatest asset, but he wanted his brother. He was a mess of wanting his brother safe again, so nothing coming out of his mouth was exactly logical at that moment.

A few seconds later, Adam appeared and raised an eyebrow. "What, are we throwing a party?"

"We need you to take us to the roadhouse," Cas said, looking over at him and moving away from Dean slightly. Dean let out a little sigh.

"Can't Dean?" he said, frowning slightly.

"He won't," he told him, tossing a glare in Dean's direction and then turning away from him again before waiting to see if he caught it. Likely he didn't, but Cas hardly cared right then. "We need you to."

"Look, I'm under Dean's command. If he won't, I won't," he said. "Sorry, kiddo."

He raised an eyebrow at him slightly. "You're not under his command."

"Basically," he said. "Dean's the biggest, baddest rebel angel in the garrison. All of us other outsiders and rebels kind of wait for what he does next."

"I am rebelling for you. You should be more grateful," Dean said, not looking at Cas either. He stared at the window, as if he wanted to fly away from the situation and stay in the sky for hours. He wondered if angels ever did things like that: just go out and fly for long amounts of time, letting the years fade away. They had a lot of years to think about when they tried to make them fade away. Way more years than Cas.

"Well, maybe I should be, but until you contribute to keeping my family safe like you promised, I don't think I'm going to be," he said.

He finally looked at him. "I'm keeping you safe, Castiel. You are the most important person in this room. Not Bobby, not Balthazar, not Adam, not me. _You._ You are more important than Gabriel. You don't think I know what happens when you save him? You don't think I haven't been told the vague details for years? You are the last in a long list of possible candidates that could've obtained your position in the war. They all failed. And now it's up to me to make sure _you_ don't!"

"As interesting as this can undoubtedly get, don't we have more important things to talk about?" Adam said, looking between Cas and Dean before Cas could respond to him. He didn't know what any of that meant, but he wanted to. He wanted to know everything that Dean knew for once. He was so angry that he had never been told all of it. All of the excitement from earlier had been transformed into anger.

"Yeah, we do," Bobby said. "I don't know about any of you, but I want to get something done."

"It's not time yet, Bobby," Dean said, turning to him. "You have to wait for me."

"You're obviously content on wasting time here now!" Cas said. "So why don't you come with us?"

"They suspect it right now," he said. "My superiors. If they find out I am at Cold Oak, they will take away all of my powers. Do you realize that? I will be _human._ I will have fallen. I will be honestly useless to you then. None of us can afford that."

"We're all human," Balthazar spoke up, "and I think we can all kick ass pretty well."

"You need an angel," Dean said, turning to him.

"We have an angel." He pointed to Adam. "Right there. Hi, angel, how are you?"

Adam smiled slightly at Balthazar and said, "I'm rather angelic currently."

"See?" he said, a little grin appearing on his face. "Dean, if they really do make you human, we'll train you to be a hunter, and we'll get your mojo back later. That's possible, right?"

"Well, yes, but it's—"

"We all have to make sacrifices," he said. "I'm willing to bet we can recruit more angels for our side anyway."

Dean looked around at all of them. His eyes narrowed, and he looked utterly helpless. Instead of staying to argue more, he disappeared, the sound of his wings fluttering behind him. The four of them looked at each other, and Adam held his arms out.

"Latch on somewhere, humans," he told them. "I'll fly you to the roadhouse."

"Thanks, Adam," Balthazar said, and he nodded.

They all grabbed on somewhere on his arm, and he flew them there. As awkward as he was sure things could be at the roadhouse, he still went in quickly with the other three. Ash was waiting for them in the bar with a laptop sitting in front of him. When they came in, he looked up. "It's not about his location. I'm sorry. It's about him, though, kind of. There is this giant devil's trap created by this guy, Samuel Colt. He invented a gun that could kill, supposedly, anything, and also these five churches connected by railroad tracks that make this trap. Word has it, the last owner of this mysterious gun is one Rachel Novak."

"Who's that?" Adam asked.

"Our mom, idiot," Balthazar told him, rolling his eyes.

"Ohhh," Adam said. He nodded slightly. "Go on."

"Well, I think the Colt is in Rachel's old safe," Ash said. "If we find that, then we can kill whatever's keeping him wherever he is. I don't think any of you want to wait until we find the key to Rachel's safe, so I was thinking we can use one of our handy angels to fly in. There shouldn't be warding against angels there, since she wouldn't have known about them."

Adam nodded. "I'll be your handy angel. Where's the safe?"

Though Cas was surprised to find out that there was a safe he'd never known about of his mom's, he didn't say anything. Ash told them where it was, and he made sure he memorized that location. Adam flew away, and they waited for him to return with this special gun.

Ellen entered the bar. "Oh, hello, boys," he said. "Talking about Gabriel? How close are you to finding him?"

"Hey, Ellen," Bobby said, smiling slightly at her, which was about as much as Bobby ever smiled. "Been a long time."

"Yes, it had been," she said, offering a smile back. "You should really come down sometimes."

"I know I should," he said, nodding. "I never really get out of Sioux Falls."

"I know you don't, you old fart," she replied, going about her business cleaning something behind the bar. "So, I asked a question. How close are you to finding him?"

"Pretty close," Bobby told her, and she nodded, not asking anymore questions.

Adam returned, waving a little box triumphantly. "Got it. There are some bullets in here too, but there aren't many. Thirteen at most, probably."

"That'll have to be enough," Cas said, reaching out for the box from Adam. He shook his head and handed it to Bobby. "Uh, why did you give it to him?"

"Because you're a mess. I don't believe you won't take it out and try and shoot me, though that would be pointless because it doesn't kill angels," he said. He shrugged slightly. "Still, it would hurt."

He rolled his eyes. "Fine, whatever," he said, fine with leaving it with Bobby anyway. "Now for—"

Before he could finish his sentence, he felt a searing pain in his head and he collapsed, forgetting where he was or who he was or what he was trying to do or say. He closed his eyes shut tightly and tried to will the pain to leave, but it stayed there. Before long, he could see something in his head, an image that he wasn't putting there. It was… a bell. The pain left as quickly as it had come, and he slowly opened his eyes as his senses returned.

"_Cas!_" Balthazar shouted, and he winced, the sound bringing on a headache, a dull throb that was nothing compared to the other pain.

"Would you shut the ever-loving fuck up for one second?" he said, looking up at his brother and all the other people hanging over him. "And move the fuck away. I'm fine."

They all moved away enough that he could stand up.

"I have no clue what just happened, honestly," he said. "I saw a bell that I've never seen before." He described the bell and the rest of the image to the best of his ability, and the others in the room sat in silence.

"I think I know that bell," Bobby said after a second. "It's in Cold Oak, South Dakota. An old ghost town everybody abandoned because it was so haunted."

"Cold Oak," Balthazar repeated. "Didn't Dean say before that Gabriel was being held at Cold Oak?"

"Oh, fuck," Adam said, grinning around at them. "Somebody sent you his location. This is getting good."

Cas smiled, though his head still ached. "So we know where he is, and we've got the gun. We can go find him now," he said. "We can go save him."

"Not without Dean though," Adam reminded them.

"Right," Cas agreed, fully intending to go out with just Balthazar and Bobby maybe without any of the angels knowing to find Gabriel themselves. They had a weapon that could kill anything except angels, and they could probably smuggle at least one angel blade. They were set. They didn't the angels. They would help, but they didn't need them.

And of course, just as things were looking bright, they all turned to shit within an instant.

The roadhouse, which was very unprotected in terms of warding away angels and demons, was vulnerable to many attacks. An angel appeared behind Ash before anyone knew what was going on, and then suddenly there was a blade protruding from the front of his stomach and Adam was disappearing. But he reappeared behind the angel and then there was also a blade coming from the angel's stomach too. There was a short, bright flash, and Adam jumped out of the way as the angel and Ash both fell in different directions. When the angel fell, the outlines of angel wings were starting to be burnt into the floor, and after a second, the entire shadow of an angel's wings was visible on the floor. Adam had his hand over his mouth in horror.

It all happened so quickly and unexpectedly that no one knew what was happening for a second, but soon Ellen and Cas were both kneeling in front of Ash, and Balthazar and Bobby were kneeling on the other side of him. Cas's hands were pressed around the knife, keeping pressure there, and Bobby was ordering Balthazar to do something. He got up and rushed in a different direction while Ellen shouted things at him too. Cas's fingers were covered in blood, and things looked grim.

Finally Adam stepped forward. "Get out of the way," he said, his voice stone cold. They looked up at him, and did as he told. All except Cas, who was keeping pressure on the wound and didn't want to leave Ash's side. Adam gently moved his hands away and pulled the knife out.

"No, don't do that!" Cas said.

But Adam didn't listen. He moved the blade aside and hovered his hand over Ash's wound. His hand was engulfed in a blue-white glow, and Cas watched as Ash's stomach healed before his eyes. When it was done, Ash opened his eyes and Adam fell back, apparently weakened by the healing.

"Holy _shit,_" Ash said, looking around. "I swear I was dead. I saw the light, man, and by the light I mean a pretty brunette chick saying it was time for me to move on."

They all sat back for a minute, shocked, until Balthazar broke the silence. "So the grim reaper is a hot brunette chick."

"Oh, would you both shut up," Ellen said, rolling her eyes at them. "I think we all know that angel came because Ash knew things about Gabriel, so you need to get him out of Cold Oak as fast as possible."

"Go without me," Adam said, looking up at him. "Dean and I will be huge beacons to all the demons and angels, if any are guarding the place. Take the angel blades."

Cas looked over at Bobby and Balthazar. Balthazar grabbed the blade that Ash had been stabbed with. Bobby went over and pulled the other one out of the angel.

"I'll stay here," Adam said. He looked at the angel he'd killed, a haunted sort of look to his eyes. "Hopefully I don't have to kill anymore siblings."

Instantly Cas felt a wave of sympathy for Balthazar. That wasn't just killing a random angel to him. He might have known that one very well before, and they went on different paths or something. Even if he hadn't known him well, it was his _brother._ It was his family, and he'd stabbed him to protect this group of meaningless humans that he'd somehow been pulled into protecting and maybe caring for slightly. He couldn't imagine the pain he was feeling.

He got up and took keys that Ellen was handing to him. "If you really need us, just call. We'll have an angel to fly us there."

Castiel nodded slightly and followed Bobby and Balthazar out the door. Bobby went to a car that must've been Ellen's and Cas handed him the keys.

"Shotgun," he called, to which Bobby rolled his eyes and Balthazar groaned. He got in shotgun and Balthazar in back, and they started their journey up to Cold Oak.

…

Upon arriving at Cold Oak, they found that whatever was left of it was surrounded by lots of trees. They all three got out. Balthazar and Cas got the angel blades and Bobby got the Colt. They all three got holy water, knives, the regular group of assorted weapons. Then they set off on foot through the woods, mostly following Bobby.

They walked for what felt like forever, and it kept going. Every time it looked like there were no more trees, it turned out that they were wrong and that there were, in fact, more trees. It was agonizingly boring, but they didn't stop. They didn't talk either, so the silence dragged on as long as the trees did. Their steps turned into slow, discouraged trudging, and eventually they were all but going on only out of the repeated thought of _Well, maybe that layer of trees right there is the last layer of trees._

When they finally did reach what seemed could be real last layer of trees, Castiel started shouting. "Gabriel!" he yelled. "Gabe!"

Balthazar yelled with him, even when Bobby told him to shut up.

Then they saw him, and Castiel broke out into the widest grin he had in a long time. There he was, barely walking along in his big tan jacket, cradling one of his arms and looking really beat-up, but he was _there._ He was _okay._ He was _alive._

He took a quick step forward, stumbling when he saw a large man in uniform behind him, holding a knife and walking menacingly toward Gabriel. His heart stopped. "Gabe, watch out!"

But it was too late, even as he started running. The knife was being driven through his little brother's stomach. He felt Balthazar running next to him as they both shouted their own anguished "_No!_" Bobby was running forward too, a shotgun in hand, the Colt tucked safely away. The man that stabbed Gabriel twisted the knife and then pulled it out, letting Sam fall to his knees as he ran away quickly. Bobby ran after him, but Balthazar and Cas stopped at Sam, both of them catching him before he fell all the way to the ground.

"Shh, let us look at you," Balthazar said in his gentlest of voices, reserved only for Gabriel when he was hurt or upset, the voice he hadn't heard since before Balthazar went off to Stanford all that time ago.

Gabe's head was slumped onto his shoulder weakly. Cas looked over and to the bloodied circle on Gabe's back. He pressed his hand up against the blood and then looked at his hand. He felt his eyes filling, but pushed the tears away for his little brothers.

Balthazar was pushing at one of Gabe's shoulders but still holding him close to him. Gabe's head swung around limply. Cas helped and pushed at his other shoulder so he was still there, close to him, but he could see them too.

"Hey, look at us," Balthazar said gently.

"It's not even that bad," Cas told him softly. "It's not even that bad, all right?" He swallowed. Blood was pooling in his mouth. His eyes were drifting in and out of focus, opening and closing tiredly.

"Gabe?" Balthazar said quietly, starting to break.

Everything in his heart was breaking. His world was crashing down around him and it was hard to breathe for the smallest of seconds, before he pulled it together, not allowing Gabriel to be dead. It wasn't an option. It wasn't something that was supposed to happen. The reason that all of the events of last few months had happened was so that Gabriel would end up okay.

"Gabriel!" he shouted at him, willing him to come back to him. "Listen to me, okay? We're going to patch you up, make you good as new, understand?" Everything in him was burning with an unfamiliar, horrible pain. Gabe's head was swinging around like crazy now, unable to stay up. "We're going to take care of you, me and Balthy. That's our jobs. We're your big brothers."

"We got you," Balthazar said softly through his tears.

"Yeah, we do. We gotta take care of our pain in the ass little brother, haven't we?" he said quietly, cupping the side of Gabe's face slightly, trying to keep it from rolling around.

"Yeah," he agreed.

But his eyes weren't opening this time. He ran his hand over his face. "We're here, man," he said quietly, but they still weren't opening, and he was getting even more scared. "Gabriel. Gabriel? Gabe!" Every word accentuated the pain that was thriving in his chest, threatening to snap his heart in two. "No." It hit him slowly, the realization of what was going on, that there was no patching Gabe up, but he wouldn't let that realization all the way in, because that would make it true. "No no no no no no no no."

He pulled him closer to him as Balthazar started to cry next to him, whispering no's too, wrapping his arms tighter around their little brother. "Oh God," he said, because there it was. There was that stupid voice somewhere in him, telling him that his brother was dead, that it was all over, that he'd failed, that he was so stupid because he couldn't even fucking save his own brother.

And then he was crying too, and tears were spilling, and he couldn't stop them anymore. "Gabriel!" he yelled one last time, like it would bring him back, but it wouldn't.

Gabriel was dead.


	12. Chapter 12

**So yeah, I'm back! I'll start updating regularly again. I won NaNo, so yeah, that's over now.**

**There are probably a ton of things wrong with this, but considering I haven't seen All Hell Breaks Loose in a while and it took me weeks to write this because of my novel, yeah... meh. I just wanted to get it out here.**

* * *

_Gabriel was dead._

_…_

It probably started a month before Gabriel was taken. He felt these pains that he told Castiel were just migraines, and Castiel believed him because he always did when Gabe put on his pouty face and pretended like he was hurt and he wanted him to stop talking so he could get over the headache. But he started to see things when he got these headaches. The first time, it was in his sleep. It was a dream, and he woke up with a headache. He thought it was nothing more than that: a dream. But then the next case they went on, he saw the girl from his dream die the same way he saw it happen.

He was freaked out, so he said nothing. He thought it was just a fluke, that he'd maybe seen her before, because they'd been to that town before. He wrote it off and told himself it wouldn't happen again. He didn't want to alarm his older brother. He kept it to himself and he was fine with that at first, because for a couple days it did seem to be a fluke.

Then it happened again.

And again.

And again.

Until finally, the dreams stopped, and it came while was awake. Sometimes just after he woke up, sometimes while he was researching, sometimes when he was in the middle of a fucking _case_, and he couldn't brush it off as easily then, because when he got these visions of sorts, he blacked out and was aware of nothing else until they were over. They helped him with the cases, but they also almost got him and Castiel killed a couple of times. And they were terrifying. He didn't know why they were happening, but he refused to talk about it.

So a month in, he didn't think anything of the agonizing pain that was starting to flash through his head, warning him of the upcoming vision that he was getting accustomed to. He didn't want to mess Castiel up on the case, so he told him he wasn't feeling well and he laid down, preparing for it.

But this time, the vision was different. It wasn't a case. He didn't think so at least. All he saw was a light, but it was weird. It was like the light was a… _person,_ and he knew whoever the person was. He tried to see the light better in his vision but it wasn't like he could control it. He watched as the light slowly died down, dimming, and all that was left was a vague shape made of glowing white-bluish mist with golden wings extending out on either side of the mist. _Angel._ The word flashed through his mind. The angel was definitely heavenly. It was beautiful, in fact.

As soon as the vision had come, it was gone, but he wanted it back. He wanted to yank it closer to him and keep staring at the image of the angel in his vision. He was confused now that he was out of his vision state, though, because angels didn't exist, and if they did, he was sure they wouldn't just be glowy little weird-shaped things with massive wings to power their barely-there bodies. If you could call them bodies at all.

He lay down in bed, because he was going to have to pretend like he was sick and he didn't know how long he'd been blacked out. He closed his eyes and drifted off surprisingly quick, seeing as he wasn't tired.

_There was a man with yellow eyes in front of him, painfully familiar, but he was sure he'd never seen him before in his entire life. He crept toward him, an eerie, predatory smirk on his face. The man himself was a very nondescript, average guy, but his eyes were swirly and different shades of yellow and brownish. They were evil, he could tell that much, but he didn't know what this man was. Somehow he knew this wasn't a vision, and he began to panic as he realized that whatever this was, it was manipulating his dreams._

_"Hello, Gabriel," it said slowly, taking another step forward, too close for comfort now even if it wasn't that close. He wouldn't refer to it as a man. Whatever it was, it wasn't good._

_"What's going on?" he managed to get out, a weak question under the circumstances. He was unarmed, but why wouldn't he be? This thing wouldn't supply him weapons to irritate him in the dream. He took a step back from it._

_"I'm going to take you somewhere, Gabriel. You're going to be there for a while, and only one person can leave," it told him. "I want it to be you. But you have to do something for me to leave this place."_

_"What the hell are you?" he snapped at him._

_"You're going to have to kill everyone that comes in. They're going to have powers too, like the visions you've been having. If you get powerful enough, you'll be able to start using their powers though," he said. "I wanted to give you a heads-up, because I'm rooting for you."_

The dream was weird and disoriented, and when he woke up, he saw the man from it standing before him. His eyes weren't yellow though. He stepped forward toward him, his steps menacing without even really having to be that menacing. He held his hand up, smashing Gabriel back against the wall behind the motel bed. He couldn't move at all, couldn't even speak, could hardly breathe. All he could do was sit there, thinking, _This is it. I'm going to die. I should've gone on the case. Castiel is going to have to come back and see the body and be alone…_

The man wrapped a hand around his wrist and then they weren't at the motel anymore. That was, admittedly, when he realized that Yellow Eyes was a demon.

The first round at Cold Oak was a learning experience. He hid quickly, worried about what the demon had told him in the dream. He didn't want the others there to figure out that they had to kill each other and then kill him. He was terrified, and as he hid in an old, long-abandoned house, he searched for a weapon before finding himself a closet and sitting in it, waiting for trouble. He felt alarmingly young and vulnerable in there, but the worst part was when he heard people enter the house, there was a shriek and blood flowed slowly into the closet, and he felt himself wanting to run away. He had been through a lot of things before, and some of them alone, but he was more afraid than usual. He wanted his brother, wanted Castiel to be there to back him up, but he wasn't there.

He was terrifyingly alone.

The door to the house opened again and he heard a girl say, "Tony?" before screaming loudly, likely at the sight of the body. "Tony! Oh my God! Violet, what did you do?"

Gabriel closed his eyes and curled further in on himself, clutching the knife. He should've gotten into a position where he could pounce at someone if they opened the closet door, but it was too late. It would make too much noise, and he didn't want to go up against whoever this Violet chick was, because obviously she was willing to kill for this demon's competition.

"Shut up," the second girl whispered, just barely loud enough for Gabriel to hear. "There's someone else in here… I can sense them."

"Is—is that your power, Violet?" the screaming girl said tentatively.

He didn't know if the Violet one nodded or not, but she didn't speak for a second. Finally she explained, "It's like a sixth sense. I know where things are positioned." There were footsteps creeping slowly toward the closet that Gabriel was, and he tensed, breathing as quietly as possible. "I know how people move. It's surprisingly helpful. I can influence movement, I think."

"Why aren't you killing me?" she asked quietly.

"Because you have the power of mind-reading. You aren't a threat. I'm taking out the threats first," she said slowly, still stepping closer and closer to the closet. The other girl was stupid. She kept asking instead of running, running very far away, though he didn't expect that the demon would let them out of his precious game so easily. Or maybe she was smart. Maybe she had a plan. Whatever, it didn't matter. All that mattered was that he was going to be killing an innocent girl that was just influenced by the demon that had rounded them all up soon, and it made his stomach form a knot.

The closet door swung open suddenly, and before Violet could react, he lunged at her, wrapping his hand around her throat and moving to stab her chest, maybe try to puncture a lung, before he felt his muscles go limp and his arms dropping to his side against his will. He felt more terrified than he ever had before, and his eyes darted to the other girl, who was watching him helplessly, sympathetically.

Mind-reading. Well, that may not have been enough to keep the girl alive against competitors like Violet, but Gabriel was definitely going to take advantage of this girl's power.

_There are knives in the drawer next to you. Keep talking and she might not notice you grabbing one._He kept repeating this over and over, staring at Violet's face as she observed him.

She was pale and her green eyes were full of insanity. Her hair was fair and short, and her face was smattered with freckles. She wasn't very tall, but in terms of average heights for women, she wasn't short either. She was slightly short than Gabriel. She couldn't have been more than two inches shorter, though, so he guessed she was about 5'6, which didn't matter much in terms of _anything_, but he was stupid and scared and weird things were all he could think about.

Finally the girl behind Violet seemed to get it, and just on time too because he felt himself handing the knife he was holding over to her, though that was the last thing he wanted to do. He was careful not to look at the girl, conveying the fear he felt to make it more believable that Violet had the upper hand. He didn't have to fabricate any of it, at least.

He looked away when the girl came up behind the Violet one and stabbed her, wincing. He didn't want for that to happen, but there it was. She fell to the floor, no longer controlling Gabriel. He took the knife from her hand and flipped her onto her stomach carefully, seeing what he could do about the wound. He looked up at the girl that had stabbed Violet. "See if that sink is working so I can help her."

"No way, she'll kill all of us," she said, frowning at him. "Just leave her be and hand me the knife."

He raised an eyebrow at her. "Are you kidding me? You'll just let her die?"

"She killed Tony! She'd have killed you and me!" the girl shouted at her.

"If you let her die, you're no better than her," Gabriel snapped at her, standing up and thankful for those two inches he had over her. He didn't tower over her by any means, but she had to look up at him, and though he looked like a cute little kid—and fuck, he was _eighteen_, the resting puppy face should have gone away about _five fucking years ago_—he had a furious bitchface, which he used right then.

She stood firmly there, and he glared at her and rushed to see if the water worked, which it didn't. He looked back at the girl, who was rasping and bleeding out.

Fuck. He was going to have to leave her there. He knelt down next to her and tore off cloth from his shirt and tried to staunch the flow of blood, but it was completely pointless and he was too confused to think straight. His mind was on a million things at once, and one of the biggest of those things was _I need to get to Castiel._

After another second, there was a raspy, spluttering gasp, and then the girl was dead. He stood up and looked down at her sadly, before up at the other girl. She seemed terrified of him.

"Do you really think that after trying to save the girl that nearly killed me, I'm going to hurt you?" he said. He did not like this girl at all, but he wouldn't hurt her. "I'm Gabriel, if I haven't said so already. Who are you?"

"Tanya," she said quietly.

"All right, Tanya, what's going on? I've been holed up in the closet."

"We—we don't know. Demons or something. We all have powers, and we think that we're supposed to kill each other, except Tony and Violet are already dead. It's just Mason, you, and me left," she said shakily. Gabriel reluctantly pulled the knife from Violet's back and handed it to her. She looked at it with her nose slightly wrinkled. "But, I—"

"Oh, _come the hell on,_" he snapped at her. "Don't be a fucking _baby_. Yeah, it's got blood. Guess what? That's 'cause of you. Yeah, and me, because I told you to, but this isn't a fun thing we're going to be dealing with here, I don't think, so yeah, blood. Don't get queasy. Take the damn knife in case a demon or this Mason guy tries to kill you."

He was pissed off at her, and ridiculously so. She was an _idiot._

She took the knife slowly, and Gabriel nodded to her. "Good. What's the Mason guy's power?"

"Um, telekinesis, we think," she said quietly. "It's not super powerful, but it's good enough."

With a nod, Gabriel walked out of the house he had taken refuge in. Finding himself in a position of power, however unimportant that power was, was filling him with courage again. He needed to be in control of the situation, in control of himself, less in danger of _dying_because some son of a bitch demon decided to chuck him in a ghost town with a bunch of other asshole psychos with inexplicable powers like him. He heard the sound of Tanya's footsteps behind him as he searched for Mason. When he saw the boards floating up in front of a door, he knew they'd found him.

They went around the side of the building he had gone into and found him in the front room, which was a parlor of sorts. This town was old, but this place seemed old even for the town's time before it was deserted. The Mason guy was boarding the door up distractedly, and when Tanya cleared her throat, he jumped and turned to them with widened eyes.

"He came to me," he whispered. "He came to Tony and Violet first, but he made me dream about him." He was shaking, and suddenly one of the boards he had been floating out the window was aimed at them like he was going to throw it at them. "The demon, he said he wanted me. But I had to prove myself, 'cause I'm not his favorite. I've gotta kill you two."

Tanya took a step back, her eyes wide, clutching her knife tightly. "No, I can't die. I've got to go home."

Gabriel looked between them. "We all want to go home," he said, also clutching his knife, because things were very, very close to getting violent. They hadn't been there long at all, and they were already down to three and ready to get down to one. Gabriel _refused_ to hurt either of them. He might knock them out, but he would not hurt them unless there was no other option. He wanted to get out, but not at the cost of one of their lives.

And then it was happening. The wood flew at Tanya's face and she was down. He stepped forward but froze, eyes wide. "My head," he shrieked, his voice high and strained.

And they went back and forth with their powers. Gabriel stepped in to stop them, but his mind was paralyzed with a wave of pain and he staggered backwards, and the next thing he knew, Tanya was dead, the pain was gone, and Mason was over him, ready to kill him with Tanya's knife.

He kneed him, and the guy fell off of him, groaning like crazy, and Gabriel was pleased to realize that he'd caught him in the balls.

He found himself on top of him, pulling the knife out of his hand but keeping it in his own, ready for this telekinesis guy to come at him with something big and floaty and all around not something he would like to have impaling him or smashing him in the head. He still didn't want to hurt this guy, but if there was something hurtling toward his head because of the continued living of the guy he had pinned underneath him, he would without hesitation defend himself.

He didn't want to hurt him, but he wanted to get back to Castiel and Bobby.

"Listen, man," he started out slowly, keeping his voice as reasonable as possible, and it was hard, because _damn_, people were insane, and psycho people with crazy powers combined with demons that he'd been hunting since his father's death—well, not really, considering he'd only been six months old at the time, but still—made for a really confusing, panic-inducing situation. "I wanna get out too, believe me. But we've got a better shot of getting past the demon if we're together."

"I don't care about getting past the demon!" the guy said underneath him, maybe trying to shout, but he was too startled and frightened to get it above a pathetic little breathy snap. "I just want to go home. I'll do what he wants, I just want to go home."

Gabriel sighed. "I'll get you home," he said, "and that way you don't have to murder a load of people for a demon. I'd take my chances with me, if I were you."

"Yeah, well, you'd do that because you're you," he said, rolling his eyes slightly. "I'm me, and I want to just go with the demon. It's easier, and I'll get home quicker. That's all I care about. I want to go home."

He was like a little kid, and in some ways, Gabriel wanted to feel sorry for him, but at the same time he wanted to tell him to get his ass up and march out with him like he wasn't some asshole little three-year-old. He knew that not all people were accustomed to situations like this, and that this guy was probably just pulled straight from his domestic life into this crap, but hell, this was life-or-death. There was no time for this crap.

"I don't think I can leave here if you're staying," Gabriel snapped at him, "so you get your ass the hell up and come with me."

"No. If you want to leave so bad, kill me."

He stared at this guy for a second—Mason or whatever—and felt utterly _trapped_. He wasn't going to kill him. He refused to kill him. So instead he picked him up, swinging him over his shoulder, finding him to be unsurprisingly light—he was rather scrawny—and started to carry him out of the house as he protested. "Put me down! Put me down!" Gabriel vaguely feared that he would use his telekinesis against him, but for the time being it didn't look like he was going to. He still had the knife to use at the last second—_if he had to._ He didn't want to unless it was absolutely necessary to his survival.

It could very well be, with the flight risk that this guy was.

What if the guy succeeded though? He doubted Castiel knew about this, and if he didn't, there was no way for Bobby or Balthazar to know either. He would die without them ever know what happened to him, where he went, who took him and killed him. He realized that Castiel would blame himself, because that was just the type of person Castiel was, to blame himself. He didn't want his older brother to carry his guilt for the rest of his life. He wanted to protect him from it, protect him from something for once. Castiel babied him so much it was suffocating sometimes, but he snuck in his share of the coddling here and there on cases when he got hurt, to give him a taste of his own medicine.

He didn't want to die. He didn't want to leave Castiel alone. If Castiel had no one to go to, and he was almost certain that nothing would drive him to go find Balthazar—he was too proud of Balthazar getting out of the life, of him getting into Stanford and rocking his intelligence against all odds, even if he covered it up with anger and disappointment and pain at him leaving them—but if Castiel was alone, he was sure that he would do something really stupid and end up dead. He didn't want to be the cause of his older brother's death. He didn't want to be the reason that he finally decided there was no reason to go on anymore.

And he knew that Bobby had other people he relied on, even though he never really thought about them and when he did it was weird, like he was protective of Bobby, claiming him as _his, his surrogate dad, his Bobby, not yours_—but anyway, he wondered if he was close enough to any of them for them to replace the void of Castiel and Gabriel. He wondered if he would call Balthazar. He was almost sure that he wouldn't, just as reluctant to pull him away from it all as Castiel was.

The board was flying at him before he even had time to finish his thoughts. He ducked away from it but dropped Mason quickly. Now that the time came to kill him, he couldn't do it. He stared down at him, mouth opened, a word half formed there but not coming out.

"Please," he said, when he finally let it slip through his lips. "Don't make me do this."

"Do it," the guy said through his teeth, and another thing flew at him, sharp, following him when he tried to duck from its path. He had no choice; he drove the knife down into Mason's forehead quickly, in a fluid stab, before staggering back and away from the trajectory of the knife at the last second. It flew past him and buried itself in the siding of a house.

Eyes wide, he moved away from Mason's body quickly. He looked around the ghost town. Seeing the woods off to the side, he started to run, as fast as he could, trying to get away. He didn't get very far before everything turned to darkness.

…

_In his dream, Yellow Eyes was smiling happily down at him as he sat up and rubbed at his aching head. "Congratulations, Gabriel," he said, his voice too happy for Gabriel's liking. Anything that made the demon happy was not something he wanted to do._

_He'd killed Mason. Of course the demon was happy. Gabriel had won for him. He had played his game._

_"There aren't many more rounds before the end," he said. "By the end, though, you should be a proper king for me, if you're still alive." He smiled at him. "I'm going to shove you in a shed and when you wake up, you'll be fully fed and it'll probably be a week or so later."_

…

The next thing he knew, he was in the dark. It was cramped in the tiny little space he was stuck in. He stood up, panicked, and felt around for a door. He felt the crease between two and tried to push it open, but as he'd suspected, it wouldn't open. He kicked it, and after a few tries, it fell down, revealing that it was nighttime, and he was still trapped in the shed.

He found the other four in the house, talking about how scared they were and about how someone with yellow eyes had talked to them in a dream.

When their eyes fell on them, they all stood up quickly. There were three guys and a girl in front of him. They were all holding knives, and he realized now that he didn't have any kind of weapon. He threw his hands up in surrender. "I don't want to fight you!"

But that was exactly what happened. They five of them talked, Gabriel told them about what he'd experienced last time, and then the other four turned on each other.

Again, he had had no choice but to kill the last one.

The demon came to him, and then everything was darkness again.

…

Talia. Annemarie. Jason. Kyle. Macy. Jenna. Pierre. Jackson. Winnie. Mikel. Winston. Janet.

On and on and on.

By the time the batch that involved Winnie, Mikel, Winston, and Janet arrived, he knew the drill, and he knew that there was no point in trying to talk to them, but he still waited until they turned on each other to try to kill them. He killed two that time, just because he knew he had to if he ever wanted to see his brothers again. He wanted to go home. He remembered Mason. He didn't know how long it had been since he had seen Castiel.

When the demon came to send him into sleep until the next four came, he welcomed it, because he knew he would dream dreams of home, of Impalas and blue-eyed brothers and gruff old men that loved him unconditionally.

…

Lenny. Sierra. Maya. Minnie.

Lenny was nice. He talked to Gabriel about his time back home, and though Gabriel decided that he thoroughly didn't care and he would rather not talk to him for fear of getting attached—though that was a far-fetched thing, getting attached to anyone that was sent to kill him—he knew that he was very nice. Lenny understood that Gabriel had to kill him, and that Lenny had to kill Gabriel. Apparently, he didn't care.

It wasn't until Sierra came back, cackling and holding Maya and Minnie's heads that Lenny turned on him.

Gabriel killed Lenny before he killed Sierra, simply because he was there. Why bother reasoning with him?

When the demon sent him under that time, he dreamt of the possibilities, of the what-ifs, of what might have happened if he had worked with Lenny.

…

Georgie. Susan. Cindy. Trenton.

By now, he didn't care. He played stupid until they figured it out, and then he called upon their powers—and oh, it was so _easy_ to do this, because as soon as he knew what it was, if he concentrated on how they used it, he could use it too, and maybe that was his true power—and used them against them. Georgie could slow time. So, he slowed time, stepped forward, and stabbed her before she could blink.

Susan had already killed Trenton. He thanked her before he used her power of controlling demons to sic one of the many that resided in the ghost town on her.

Cindy was a poor, trembling, cowardly thing. He found that he didn't care when he stabbed her.

She whined too much.

…

Lucy. Whitney. Maria. Ella.

Ella reminded him of Castiel. He was reminded of what his original plans had been: kill them only if necessary, only to get back to his brother, only because he had a family that he needed to return to. At the thought of this, he outright laughed, because he found that he still missed his family, and that weakness amongst all the bullshit he'd dealt with recently was downright _hilarious._

He killed Ella slowly. It was the first of the kills that he dragged out.

Lucy killed Whitney and Maria killed Lucy. Lucy put up a fight, the biggest one yet. One from the last batch, Ricky, had also put up a fight, but Lucy was even stronger than him.

He killed her too.

…

He found himself striving for the prize when the demon came and told him that this was the last one, this was the one for all the marbles. He surveyed his opponents carefully this time.

Lily. She could electrocute people by touching them. Ha—that would be useful.

Jake. He was super strong. Also useful.

Ava. She could see the future, like him. He wondered what her second power was. All the people who could see the future all had second powers. His was taking advantage of others'.

Andy. Oh, Andy. He could make you do things. He could put things in your head.

He played stupid, like always, and panicked when the others seemed panicked, letting Jake take over after Lily killed herself. He wasn't stupid. He knew that Ava did this, but he pretended he didn't, because what fun was it if all the shit broke out now, rather than later, when he had time to send Castiel a little message?

"Andy, can you do something for me?" he asked. "My brother, Castiel, he knows about these kinds of things. He'll be able to get us out of here. I just need you to put something in his head."

"Uh, sure," he said, frowning slightly but nodding. "What?"

"A bell," he said. "The bell out there. His name is Castiel Novak."

"Okay," Andy said. He closed his eyes, concentrating, and sent the image to Castiel's mind. "Okay, that should've worked."

"Thanks, man," he said, smiling gratefully at him. The others sat awkwardly, the silence palpable, as they tried not to mention the dead girl hanging up outside.

He glanced at Ava. She caught his gaze, and she _knew._

The first person she sent the demon for was Jake, maybe because of his super strength, but before it could kill him, Gabriel used Jake's super strength and snapped Ava's neck. It was easy, clean, and now Andy and Jake were staring at him, unaware that he could do that.

"I can also use other people's powers," he told him, approaching them slowly, and they could see the malice behind his walk.

Now that Ava and Lily were dead, he couldn't use demons or electrocute them, but he could try to get them to do things.

Before he had time to try, Jake was coming toward him, ready to fight him, and Gabriel smirked. As long as Jake was alive, he possessed the same strength as he did. When he went to punch him, Gabriel ducked out of the way and punched back. He turned toward Andy, and the guy was so powerless against him that he just stood there, wide-eyed, saying, "No, no, no, please, man, please…" But then his neck was snapped too, and he was walking out, because this little house was too crowded for the epic final battle he'd had in mind.

And then suddenly everything was _screaming_, and he was enveloped in darkness again. Yellow Eyes stood over him, grinning. He pressed his hand to his face, and he didn't remember why he'd felt so strongly about winning anymore. He just wanted to go home. He just wanted to go home.

When he woke up, Jake was there. He stepped on his leg with tremendous force, and Gabriel let out a strangled cry of pain. He scrambled away from him, gasping and crying out as he was causing more pain on his newly broken leg. He came back against a fence, and Jake was stalking toward him slowly, a knife in hand. He pulled himself to his feet, and Jake was right in front of him again. He swung a punch at him, but Jake just grabbed his arm and broke it too.

"Jake, please," he said quietly, "_please._"

He frowned for a second, confused almost, and Gabriel took this time to punch him, hard enough to knock him out. When he fell to the ground, he sighed in relief, and his eyes widened when he heard his name being called by a welcome, familiar voice.

_Castiel._

And… _Balthazar?_

He went towards the woods slowly, pain roaring through his leg and arm, unsure of how he was still going. He could feel black start to fill his vision when he heard Castiel shout, "Gabriel, watch out!"

And then he was being _stabbed_—and oh, God, yeah, that hurt. He started to fall, but he was in someone's arms, and it took him too long to realize that it was Castiel and Balthazar, and Bobby was running after Jake, and…

They were talking. Words. He didn't know why he was awake, but he kept trying to be awake, sure there was a reason.

But there stopped being a reason after a second.

And then he just didn't care, didn't remember why he should care, so, slowly, he let go.


	13. Chapter 13

**I don't usually respond to people's reviews (only because I forget, not because I don't want to) so I'm just going to say one big mass thank you for the reviews I've gotten so far. I appreciate all of them (all seven, lol). I love getting feedback on my stories because who doesn't love getting feedback.**

**So. I don't want to make each "season" a different story, so I'm just going to say that everything that I've written for this story so far was part one, and after this chapter everything will be part two. **

**And I realize after watching All Hell Breaks Loose: Part 2 for this chapter that I did a lot of shit wrong last chapter. But hey, you know, this is AU so it doesn't need to be canonically accurate.**

**Sorry for the lack of angels and all things Destiel and Sabriel for a while (I've been especially lacking in the Sabriel department, haven't I?), but after this chapter there will be all sorts of lovely angst from the boys about their angelic crushes.**

* * *

_And then he just didn't care, didn't remember why he should care, so, slowly, he let go._

* * *

Castiel wished he was numb to the world. The only thing that kept him from drinking copious amounts of alcohol to drown out the pain was Balthazar. Bobby didn't help, not really, though he tried to, bringing them food and not restocking his alcohol once it was gone—and it was gone rather quickly, between the three of them. But Cas had the Impala, and no one was taking his baby away from him, so he drove to town and got more, drinking it down until the pain seemed a little more bearable, but never bearable enough. He sought out the relief of the bottom of the bottle, but rarely indulged in it unless he felt a particularly strong stab of pain at Gabriel's dead body. The next couple of days dragged on like years, and Adam and Dean both ignored their prayers.

He wanted to know if they could save him. He just wanted to know.

_Dean, please,_ he begged the first night, the tears dripping down his face slowly as he cradled the empty bottle, hugging it close like it was Gabriel. _Please, please, please. I just want to know. If you can't bring him back I won't hate you. I just want to know._

Maybe Balthazar heard him thumping around his room, searching for more: bourbon, beer, vodka, _anything._ Or maybe he started praying out loud and he just didn't realize it, but soon he was being tucked into bed like he was little kid, and Balthazar was clearing the bottles and glasses away. He hugged him, though Cas was half asleep and never wanted to wake up, and whispered, "Stay with me, Cassie. I need you."

Then he was gone before Cas could even process he'd been there, and he was drifting off to sleep.

It was the third day, or something like that, when Cas was standing in the doorway of the room with Gabriel's body, which smelled slightly as it started to decay. They had to do something, had to fix this before his body got gross and things started to really fall apart and out and—eugh. He couldn't let Gabriel get like that. He had to bring him back, but the only way he knew how—no. He couldn't do that. Could he?

They say people look like they're sleeping when they're dead, but Cas knew that had to be if you'd never seen the person alive, because Gabriel looked dead. He was not smiling. He was not bright and full of the life that Gabriel was always full of, even at the darkest times, maybe just for Cas's benefit alone. He wasn't Gabe, he wasn't Cas's little brother; he was a corpse, nothing more. It hurt to see him, to look at him, but he couldn't look away.

Balthazar was out, maybe, or asleep, and Bobby came in. "Castiel?" he called as he came in. He saw him as he turned and looked at him walking into the house. He didn't remember him going, didn't remember where he'd went. "Brought you this back." He held up a bucket of something—food, he processed after a second. The idea of eating made his stomach churn.

He turned back to the room and said after a second, listening to Bobby move around the house, "No, thanks, I'm fine." He felt fine, at least when it came to hunger and thirst and sleep, though he knew he needed all three desperately.

"You should eat something," Bobby said.

"I said I'm fine," he said. He turned back into the room and picked up a drink, sucking it down without second thought.

Bobby was right there, watching him, his eyes boring holes into his head, but he cared so little about that that he disregarded it entirely, setting the bottle down and screwing the lid back on. "Cas," he said gently, using the nickname. He was glad that Gabriel had never called him Cas, or he would find the name intolerable. If it weren't for Balthazar, he would never let anyone call him _Cassie_ again. "Don't you think it's time… we bury Gabriel?"

He looked at him, almost not believing that Bobby had already given up, but then he remembered that Balthazar and Bobby probably both had, and had discussed his drinking and "obsessiveness" already. They probably were trying to help him, now that they'd talked behind his back. "No," he said forcefully, but calmly at the same time, quietly. He sat down, keeping his eyes on Bobby as long as he could, and feeling Bobby's eyes when he looked away.

"Well, we could… maybe…" he tried, feebly.

"What?" he said, fed up with the conversation already. "Burn him? Torch his corpse? No, Bobby, not yet."

Bobby bent down, getting almost eye level with him, forcing him to look back up. "I want you to come with me," he said, also forcefully, but with the same level of calmness.

"I'm not going anywhere," he said, and he wasn't. He wouldn't. Nowhere but to get alcohol, and he trusted Balthazar not to let Bobby take Gabe away, but now he knew he couldn't leave at all, couldn't trust either of them, certain they'd spoken about him already.

"Cas, please," he said, obviously getting a little annoyed with his behavior.

"Why don't you cut me some slack?" he said. His little brother just died. He'd _failed_, more than ever before. Couldn't Bobby see that?

"I just don't think you should be alone, that's all," he said, "and Balthazar's going with me." Cas knew the implications of this. _I don't think you should be alone_ could be translated easily into _If you're alone I'm afraid you'll drink all the alcohol and you'll do something really stupid._ "I gotta admit, I could use your help." He let out a dry puff of air that resembled a laugh of disbelief. "Something big is going down. End of the world big, Cas."

"Well, then, let it end!" he shouted angrily, done with Bobby, done with the conversation, _done with the whole fucking world_, because what use was the world if there was no Gabriel?

He stared at him for a moment, refusing to think that Cas was saying what he actually felt. "You don't mean that," he said.

He stood up abruptly, fury coursing through him, out of nowhere and yet having been there since Gabriel died at the same time. He got in Bobby's face. "You don't think so? Huh?" And some sick fucking part of him, the part that he hated but was thriving now, enjoyed the look of what was almost _fear_ on Bobby's face. "You don't think I've given enough?" And that sentence was weighted, full of all his pain and so controlled. Bobby looked away from him. "You don't think I've given enough?" He glanced towards Gabriel's room. "I'm done with it. All of it. And if you know what's good for you, turn around and get the hell out of here."

He didn't know where this was coming from, and yet he did, and he wanted no one but Gabriel. He could feel Dean's pulsations, the feelings spilling through sometimes, a simple flicker of apprehension there and a touch of frustration here. He _loathed_ it, loathed that connection the angel that wouldn't even bother trying to help him, and he loathed that Gabriel was dead, and he loathed himself, and he loathed everything, and he just wanted to _not be there._

And Bobby wasn't moving, and it was this or cry, and he was looking at Cas like he was an entirely different person and that _hurt _but it didn't snap him out of things.

He shoved Bobby, hard, shouting, "Go!" And the anger was pumping through him and Bobby looked _scared._

Like Cas was gone too.

Well, that pulled him right out, and he felt a wave of guilt wash over him, drowning him, pushing him under again, and he couldn't look Bobby in the eye anymore. "Sorry," he whispered, unable to get anything else out. "I'm sorry." He walked away, feeling like he was going to break down. "Please, just go."

Bobby left, and then he did break down, just for a second. Balthazar came down. "What was all that?"

And he was crying and he couldn't stop but somehow through all that he managed to say, "Bobby left and I just want you to go too." And he needed to hurt Balthazar, needed to get him to go, so when he approached him, to hug him, get him to change his mind, to fall into the security of having Balthazar there, he snapped, "Get the hell away from me, Balthazar. _Go._ Before Bobby's gone, _go!_"

He felt bad for that one too, but after a second, Balthazar scurried away.

So he was alone with Gabriel. He went to the doorframe again, and leaned there, and cried until he couldn't anymore, and then he began to talk, with nothing else to do.

"When we were little you were Mom's favorite, you know," he said quietly, and he didn't think, just kept talking, "and God, it showed. She protected you so much. Wouldn't let me tell you. Got mad if I tried. But you kept asking, you know, 'cause that's Gabe, just as curious as Balthy. And we didn't tell you. And hell, Balthazar was stronger than me sometimes when he was five, and I couldn't stop crying 'cause Mom got mad at me for something I did, or didn't do, to you. None of that was your fault, though, you know. I had to protect you, and when I didn't do it right, I felt wrong. Bad. Knew I messed up. I couldn't—couldn't. I just couldn't. Couldn't fail you. And guess what I've done now, Gabe?" And his voice cracked, and though he thought he was all cried out, he felt more coming. "I'm sorry, man, I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Gabe. It's just what I do." He smiled, but it wasn't real, wasn't—wasn't a smile. He wiped the tears that were coming away. "I'm sorry. I let you down, you know. I'm all fucked up, Gabe, broken and—and—and I let down the people I love. Ya know, I let Mom down a lot. And Balthazar, and Bobby, and… now I'm just supposed to let you down too, but… Gabe. I can't. I can't, man, I can't. Can't do that, I just… can't live with myself, but what am I supposed to do?" He asked like Gabe would answer, and when he didn't, he almost cried again, feeling it creeping up.

He couldn't. Couldn't cry again. So he marched out of the room, grabbed the keys to the Impala after collecting everything he needed. He needed a crossroads. Needed a crossroads. Needed a demon.

He thought this over and over and over, _for Gabe, for Gabe, for Gabe_, as he drove faster than he should to the nearest crossroad he could think of. He pulled the little box out, went to the middle, and dug a little hole, waiting for a demon to show up after covering it with dirt.

None came for a second, as he looked around, and he felt panic start to rise up, thinking the demon wouldn't come. "Ah, come on already!" he shouted.

"Easy, sugar, you'll wake the neighbors," a voice behind him said. He turned to find the stereotypical crossroads demon: pretty, in a nice dark dress, red eyes flashing. "Castiel, it's so good to see you."

He glared at her.

"No, really. Look at you. Gone and got your family killed, all alone in the world. It's too sweet," she said, stepping forward with a grin. He looked down at her angrily. "Well, give me a minute."

"I should send you straight back to hell," he said before she could say why.

"Oh, you should," she agreed, "but you won't." He gave her a look of disgust as she walked around him. He spun to meet her. "And I know why. You wanna make a deal. Gabe back from the dead for your soul?"

"Hundreds a demons would love to get their hands on it," he muttered at her, "and it's all yours. All you gotta do is bring Gabriel back. Ten years, and then it's all yours."

"You've got to be joking."

"It's the same deal you give everybody else," he said.

She raised an eyebrow. "You're not everybody else." She stepped closer again. "Why would I want to give you anything?"

"Nine years."

"No." She stepped away.

"Eight."

"Keep going, I'll keep saying no."

"Five years. Five years is my last offer, or no deal."

She stepped forward, grinning disbelievingly. "Oh, Castiel. Castiel." She came close enough, like she was going to kiss him, to make it happen. "Then no deal," she whispered.

"Fine," he whispered back.

"Fine," she said, smirking. "Make sure you bury Gabriel before he starts to stink up the place."

"Wait," he called back to her as she walked away, turning to face her as she stopped. He was desperate, for any way to get him back. He would give _anything_ and she knew that. "What do I have to do?"

"First of all, quit groveling. Needy guys are such a turnoff," she said. "Look, I shouldn't be doing this. I could get in a lot of trouble. What can I say? I've got a blind spot for you, Cas. I'll do it."

"You'll bring him back?" he asked, unsure if she was telling the truth at first.

"I'll bring him back. And because I'm such a saint, I'll give you one year, and one year only. But if you try to get yourself out of the deal, it's off. Immediately. And Gabriel dies. So? What do you say?"

He took her and kissed her, sealing the deal.

She was gone as soon as he was. He got into the Impala and drove back as quickly as he could, eager to see if Gabriel was alive and eager to have a distraction from the fact that he'd sold his soul. He just wanted to be with his brother. He hadn't really talked to him in so long, and the last time he had seen him alive he was dying. He just wanted to really talk to his brother.

He pulled up to the house he'd been staying at and saw that Bobby's truck was back, which meant that he and Balthazar decided to turn around to watch him, to make sure he didn't do something stupid, but they didn't come back soon enough. He had already done the stupid thing, and he wouldn't take it back for the world. Never.

He rushed into the house. He looked into Gabriel's room to see Bobby and Balthazar hugging the shit out of him while he groaned in pain but didn't protest. Castiel walked into his room quickly, pushing past the other two men as they pulled apart from Gabriel to look at Castiel. He wrapped his arms around him tightly, careful to avoid where he'd been hurt, but he still groaned all the same.

"Castiel," he said, leaning into him a little bit, and Cas felt so relieved.

"Gabe," he said quietly. "Thank God, _Gabe._"

"Ow—Castiel, ow," he said, and Cas pulled away from him, not wanting to hurt him. He didn't smile, though he was sure he might if Balthazar and Bobby weren't in there staring him down. "So, okay, what's going on?"

He looked down at him and patted him on the shoulder lightly. "Man, didn't they tell you? What do you remember?" he asked. He was immensely relieved that Gabriel didn't know yet about what Castiel had done to get him back.

"I don't know. I mean… I think… Well, you were yelling, and I went toward you, and there was a pain—really, really bad, you know—and then you ran at me, and then it's all… blank," he said. He looked up at him, golden eyes glittering with confusion and apprehension. He couldn't tell him, couldn't let him feel the guilt. He knew Balthazar and Bobby knew, though, and he knew that that meant that Gabe would find out eventually, but he didn't want him to just yet.

"Yeah, Gabe, that other guy stabbed you," he said gently.

He frowned at him. "But—wait, in the back?"

"Yes," he said. "It was… uh, it was pretty bad there for a while, but you know, Bobby got you through. Didn't you?"

"Oh. Uh…"

Gabriel turned to him, still frowning. "You did?"

"I…"

"Thank you, Bobby," he said.

"Cas, can I talk to you for a second?" Balthazar said, raising an eyebrow at him.

Gabriel grinned slightly. "Since when do we call him 'Cas'?"

Castiel smiled at his little brother. "You've been gone a while. Have Bobby bring you up to date, and tell him about whatever the hell you did the past few months."

Balthazar practically dragged him out of the room and far away from the room that Gabriel had been lying dead for the last few days in. "You're lying to him," he said, eyes dark with anger and sadness. "What did you do? Sell your soul? I remember that case we went on recently, Cas. Tell me you didn't."

He looked away from him. "We've got work to do, Balthy," he said, unable to meet his eyes. "What I did, I did because it was the right thing. The only thing. And we're not going to talk about that until I myself put a fucking bullet between that son of a bitch demon's eyes, got me? I'm gonna pray to Dean and Adam to ask for the Colt, but I doubt they answer."

He started to move away, but Balthazar caught his arm and held it tight. Cas didn't look at him, but he didn't try to move away. He let Balthazar speak. "You're going to tell him," he said, his voice low and cold, furious. "I won't be the one to tell him and I'll make sure Bobby doesn't."

"Nobody's gonna tell Gabe." He ripped his arm away from his younger brother's grasp, ignoring his eyes and Bobby's too when he went back into the room he and Gabriel were in. He smiled at his youngest brother. "Hey, so, we've got shit to do with that demon. Why don't we all head out?"

"Yeah, if I've been out for a while, I want to do something," Gabriel said. He looked at Bobby. "Are we going to your house now?"

"Yeah," he said. Cas glanced at him and found that his eyes were narrowed. He looked away and to his brother again.

"I'll drive Gabe," he said. He smiled at Gabriel again. "You take Balthazar. He's in a pissy mood. I don't wanna deal with it."

* * *

"Tell me what you remember," Cas said on the drive to Bobby's, turning the Metallica down so they could hear each other speak.

Gabriel seemed disappointed by the loss of the loud music, but then he frowned slightly, forgetting about that. "I… I don't know," he said quietly. "I only remember bits and pieces… I was there a long time. I remember every time there were four more people, and they always died. They killed each other, and then tried to kill me, so I had to kill them. I kept winning. The demon kept telling me I was winning. And then the last time, there was this kid named Andy, and he could make people see things, so I asked him to make you see where we were. I don't remember why… So you could save me, I think. And Ava could control the demons. That was her secondary power, 'cause all of us that could see the future seemed to have secondary powers. Jake was strong, and Lily could electrocute people. I don't remember how Ava, Lily, and Andy died, but Jake… didn't. I was fighting him, and right before you came, there was this thing. I thought it was another dream. I thought it was Yellow Eyes again, but I remember it. It wasn't Yellow Eyes. I don't know who it was. They took most of the memories away."

Cas glanced over at him. "Well," he said. "Well."

* * *

At Bobby's, they called Ash. He talked to them about five old churches, and iron railroad tracks that connected him, and Cas struggled to stay focused but he did as best he could. But when Bobby snapped in front of his face and asked if he heard what Ash just told them, he said no. He kept praying to Dean, over and over again—_Please, Dean, I've saved Gabe and I need you now; Please, Dean, I don't need you to raise him anymore; Dean, I need the Colt; I need you; We need you; Fine. I'm praying to Adam._

Adam didn't answer either.

"It's a devil's trap," Ash repeated over the phone, "but I think Samuel Colt was keeping something in, and it's not good."

"Wait, so no demons can get in or out," Balthazar said.

"That's what Yellow Eyes wanted us for—a little servant to get into the trap," Gabriel realized, looking around at them. "He's going to let whatever is in there loose."

"Oh, hell," Bobby said, standing up. "Where is this thing?"

* * *

They got ready to leave, and Bobby pulled Cas out to help him get some things into the back of the Impala. He knew there was nothing that needed putting back there. Bobby wanted to talk to him about it.

They stood in the middle of his junkyard. Cas went for the trunk of the Impala like he didn't know what Bobby was aiming for, getting him out there, though he did. Bobby all but pulled his head out of the trunk and got up in his face. "Tell me you didn't, boy. _Tell me you didn't._"

It was unspoken. They knew what he "_didn't_," and they knew that he did. His silence was answer enough. He wasn't going to lie to him.

"_Damn it_, Castiel," he said, shaking his head and looking away from him. "Damn it. You stupid asshole. How long'd they give you, kid?"

He looked up at him. "Bobby…"

"How long?" he snapped, and Cas knew he deserved this, from when he yelled at Bobby back at the other place alone.

"A year," he said quietly. "S'why we gotta go after this demon fucker now, s'why I'mma kill him myself. Got nothing to lose now, right?"

Bobby pulled him forward by the collar of his shirt, fury bubbling through his eyes, but hurt lying underneath, filling Cas with an ache. He saved one person and just made another one hurt. "I could throttle you!"

"All you'd be doing is sending me downstairs ahead of schedule," he remarked, and threw him a small, empty smile, to which Bobby looked even angrier with.

"What is it with you, kid? You think you gotta cater to your brothers like your life don't even matter," he said.

"It doesn't, Bobby," he said. "I had to protect Gabe, and I woulda done the same for Balthy 'cause I have to protect him too. My life don't mean anything but keeping them safe. That's why I'm here, and if I can't do that, then there isn't a point. There just isn't."

"Your life means something, Castiel! You have to see that! You have to start seeing that!"

He shook his head. "It doesn't, Bobby."

"Have you really got that low of an opinion yourself? Are you that screwed in the head?" he said.

"I couldn't let him die," he said quietly, swallowing slightly and pushing back the pain of it all. "I couldn't."

He could feel Dean all of the sudden, washed out with shame and regret, and he pushed it away. He didn't want to feel tied to him right then. Didn't want to feel him. Didn't want it.

"He's my brother," he got out, trying to ignore Dean's pain as it mingled with his own.

And there was Bobby's pain too, and he felt like that was inside him too, felt it strongly as Bobby managed, "How's your brother gonna feel when he knows you're going to hell?" It seemed like he was fighting back the tears too, and Cas felt like he couldn't do it anymore, because he couldn't. He didn't want to. He would be relieved if the demon ganked him when they went after him. At least Gabriel would never know he went to hell.

He kept his expression blank, forcing it to mirror how dead he already felt instead of betraying him and twisting up and making Bobby hug him and forgive him, because he didn't deserve to be forgiven. "You can't tell him," he said quietly. "Do whatever you gotta do to me, but please, Bobby, please don't tell him.

Bobby now really looked like he was going to end up crying, and he looked away from Cas's eyes, placing a hand on his face. "Son," he said quietly, "I love you, all three of you, and I don't wanna see any of you die. But I could rest knowing Gabe didn't go to hell."

"I failed."

"You failed nothing. They aren't your _jobs_, they're your family. Your momma failed," he said. "She failed by making you think like this. I wish I coulda—I would have been proud to be your dad, you know. Not just Balthazar's or Gabriel's—_yours._"

That seemed to be the end of the conversation. Bobby wiped at his eyes and made his way back to his house, and Cas sat there for a second, thoughtless.

* * *

Ash sent Ellen to go off with them and help at the big devil's trap, and the four of them drove recklessly to meet with her there in Wyoming. They made it to the cemetery and hid, knowing that Jake would show up, that the demon would send him there, a new panic rising halfway through when Adam showed up and scared Cas nearly shitless as he looked in the mirror to see him out of nowhere sitting between Balthazar and Bobby.

"Fuck!" he said, swerving slightly, before getting the Impala under control again.

"I'm so sorry," Adam said first, and Cas had a strong, not good feeling that it wasn't for making him swerve. "Look, Dean got a hold of the Colt. I thought it would be safe with him, but his superiors were manipulating him. They gave it to Azazel—the demon you call Yellow Eyes. It's in his boy king's hands now. He's going to use to open the Gates of Hell."

It took a moment to process, but then he asked Adam, "What do we do?"

"You go and you get it back. Angels will be watching. Rooting for Azazel for whatever reason, but they won't interfere. I can't go, or they'll kill me," he said. "This is all up to you."

So they hid, waiting for Jake to get to the cemetery, and when finally he did, they were behind gravestones, listening to him as he walked toward crypt. They jumped out at him at the signal from Bobby, all five of them pointing at guns. Cas's eyes flicked down to the Colt in Jake's hands.

He was staring at Gabriel, and Cas hoped desperately that he wouldn't say anything, but—_fuck._

"You were dead," he said, the look on his face one that could only be described as _like he'd just seen a ghost._ "I cut through your spinal cord, man."

Gabriel raised an eyebrow and looked over at Balthazar, who was closest to him. Cas knew it was all over, but was glad to see that Balthazar looked at cold as he could, not showing whether or not what Jake was saying was true. Cas copied this look onto his own face.

Jake laughed and shook his head slightly. "Well, then, this isn't going to work out, is it?" Cas was unnerved at how demonic he sounded. This was how demons spoke to him on hunts, all condescending. "Hey, lady, why don't you put your gun to your head," he said to Ellen, which Cas thought was ridiculous, until she did.

She seemed just as surprised as them, and also terrified. "I can't—" she started, but Jake cut her off. His eyes were glowing yellow, just for a second, when Cas turned back to look at him again.

"Once you give in to these abilities, there are a lot of Jedi mind tricks you can do," he said, grinning at them slightly. "It wasn't just you that could manipulate others' powers, Gabriel; it was anybody that gave in. You must've given in. Now, you should all put your guns down."

Against his will, Cas could feel his muscles complying, setting the gun on the ground and kicking it away from himself. Bobby, Balthazar, and Gabriel were doing the same, but Ellen's gun stayed against her head. He clenched his teeth when he stood up straight again, wanting to go help her.

"Okay, thank you," he said. Jake turned away from them and placed the Colt in a weird rotating lock-like thing on the crypt.

In the flash of an eye, Cas, Balthazar, and Bobby were at Ellen's side, yanking her arm away from her head, toward the sky. Two shots went off into the air and they wrestled the gun from her grip. When Cas turned back to see what Gabriel was doing, he saw him holding his gun toward Jake, and then he shot him, a few times in the back, maybe a few times too many. He went around to his side and then pointed the gun at his head, shooting him twice more in the head.

"Gabe," he said gently, and that was when he finally stopped, the look on his face purely cold. Gabriel wiped the blood off his face as the rotating lock continued to turn, opening up something.

"Oh no," Bobby said.

"What is it?" Ellen asked him.

"Hell," he said. Cas reached forward and grabbed the Colt. "Take cover, now!"

They all ran as fast as they could to the nearest tombstones. Cas flipped over one and waited there, but he only had to wait a second before a wave of dark energy flew at them, and demon smoke went past, erupting from out of the crypt.

It went slower after a second, but they were still bursting out of their too quickly, too much. Not one demon should've escaped at all.

"We've gotta shut the Gate!" Ellen shouted. She and Bobby moved from their cover and went over to the crypt, trying to force the doors shut.

Cas looked down at the Colt, and as soon as he realized that the demon would soon be there, he turned around and found him there. He pointed the Colt at him but it flew from his hands.

"Boys shouldn't play with Daddy's guns," he said, grinning. "Or Mommy's, I guess."

Then Cas was flying through the air. His head hit the gravestone Azazel or _whatever_ threw him at and he groaned, lying back against the stone.

He heard Gabriel shout his name but was only half aware of it, still too dazed from the _bad_ hit on the head he'd gotten.

"I'll get to you in a minute, champ," Azazel said. "But I'm proud of ya. Knew you had it in ya."

Cas managed to get up, but the demon just pushed him back. "Sit a spell." He stepped forward and knelt down in front of him. Cas glared, feeling the blood from his head run down his face. "So, Castiel. I gotta thank you. You see, demons can't resurrect people, unless a deal is made. Thanks to you, Gabe is back! Now, I wasn't planning on that, but I'm glad. I liked him better than Jake anyhow." He grinned at him. "Tell me, have you ever heard the expression: If a deal sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

"You call that deal good?" Cas said.

"Well, better than some," he said. "I'm surprised at you. I mean, you saw what your brother did to Jake, didn't you? How certain are you that what you brought back is all Gabriel?"

He glanced at him. Gabriel was pushed up against a tree by Azazel's power. He couldn't be sure, but at the same time he could. That was Gabe. That was all Gabe.

"You of all people should know that's what dead should stay dead," he whispered. He stood. "Anyway, thanks a bunch. I knew I kept you alive for some reason." He stepped away. "Until now, anyway. I couldn't have done it without your stupid, self-destructive, self-loathing desire to sacrifice yourself for you family." He raised the gun to kill him.

At the last second, there was white, blinding light, and Cas shut his eyes instinctively because it _hurt._ When he felt that the light was gone, he opened his eyes to see the demon on the ground, the Colt dropped next to him. He scrambled to his feet, freed from Azazel's power, and grabbed the gun, pointing it at him. When he opened his eyes, they were wide, the yellow swimming around.

Castiel shot him before he could get a word out of his pathetic mouth. He glowed from the inside, orange-red, and the yellow died away from his eyes.

It was silent in the graveyard for a second. Balthazar, Ellen, and Bobby were able to shut the Gates, and Gabriel collapsed from his spot against the tree.

They gathered around the demon's body after they had gotten over the shock. Cas looked up at Balthazar and Gabriel. He smiled slightly, and so did Gabriel. Balthazar remained expressionless.

"Check that off the to-do list," Gabriel said quietly.

"You did it," Balthazar said.

"I didn't do it alone," Castiel replied. He slipped the Colt into his jacket.

"I feel a group hug coming on," Gabriel said, smiling more, and that initiated it. The three of them, pulled back together at last—even if they would be ripped from each other again in a year—were overjoyed, their life's goal finally completed. They hugged, a mess of stupid grins and pats on the back. "I kinda can't believe it. We've been working at his our whole lives. I don't know what to say."

"I say that was for our mom," Castiel said quietly.

* * *

Ellen and Bobby left together in Ellen's car, and the brothers made their way to the Impala.

"Okay, that's really all well and good, but when Jake saw me—you know. You had to see him," Gabriel said. "Said he killed me."

"Glad he was wrong," Cas said.

"I don't think he was."

"What happened, after I was stabbed?" he asked.

"We already told you," he said. He didn't want to have this conversation. Gabriel almost seemed to be accepting that, but Balthazar had to ruin it.

"We didn't tell you everything," he said, looking pointedly at Castiel. He ignored his gaze.

"We just killed the demon, guys," he said, looking persistently at Gabriel. He forced a little smile. "Can't we celebrate, just for a minute?'

He paused, and then shook his head, eyes filling with tears. "Did I die?" he asked. "Did you sell your soul for me?"

"C'mon!" he said, looking away. "No."

"Tell him the truth," Balthazar snapped at him, still angry over it, and the worst part was that Castiel couldn't blame him for being so angry with him.

"Gabriel," he said quietly, looking between them. "Balthazar." But then the silence after that, when he looked away and at the ground, spoke more words than he could have aloud, and more tears wetted Gabriel's eyes.

"How long did you get?" he asked him.

He looked up at him and frowned, holding back his pain. "Year," he whispered.

"You—Castiel, how could you do that?" he asked. He looked to Balthazar. "How could you _let him?_"

"I tried to stop him," he said. He looked at Castiel, willing him to tell Gabriel that he did.

"He did," he said gently. "Don't you get mad at me, either of you. Don't you do that. I had to look out for you. It's my job. I would've done the same thing for you, Balthy."

"It isn't your job!" Balthazar shouted, moving so he was in front of him. He reminded Cas so much of Bobby that it was crazy. "It's _our jobs_ to look after each other, and just because Mom put it on you or 'cause you're older doesn't mean that you mean the least out of all of us. Damn it, Cas, you're our big brother."

"We'd do anything for you," Gabriel said, joining in with Balthazar, but he was much calmer than him. He didn't get in his face. He just looked at him sadly, and the disappointment and worry was almost worse than the anger that he was receiving from Balthazar. "I don't care what it takes. We're going to get you out of this."

"So get your damn ass in the backseat of the Impala and let me clean it up for you," Balthazar said, pointing. "Gabriel, you drive, and yes, you can pick the music because I miss your stupid fucking Led Zeppelin."

"Hell yeah," Gabriel said, getting in the front seat, still upset—obviously—but upset with a purpose. "We've got work to do."

* * *

**Anyway, yeah. So. Goodbye, part one. Hello, part two. Thanks everyone again for reading this far and I love seeing that people are reading and all of that stuff.  
**


	14. Chapter 14

**I'm gonna be honest and say that none of this chapter was supposed to happen after the first break. So. Uh. Yeah.**

* * *

_"Hell yeah," Gabriel said, getting in the front seat, still upset—obviously—but upset with a purpose. "We've got work to do."_

* * *

The last thing Castiel wanted to be was _coddled._ He was just going to hell, wasn't like he was dying or anything.

Oh. Wait. Yeah, he was.

The point was that Castiel was sick of being babied by everyone. It had only been a few days since he killed the demon that had killed their father—and likely killed their mother, the three of them concluded on their drive to a motel in Wyoming after the bullet was fired into the son of a bitch—and he was already tired of "Are you all right?" "Do you need anything?" "We're just making sure," and other comments of the like. He wasn't going to die for a year; for now, he was _fine._

Physically. Emotionally was a different question, but he was definitely not going to get into his emotional state with his little brothers.

The person that should have been coddled relentlessly was Gabriel, and he tried to turn it back on him and pull Balthazar into it, but Balthazar just ended up saying, "Do you need anything? I'm going out to get us food."

They were on Balthazar's laptop almost constantly, searching for ways out of demon deals. He was surprised they hadn't found anything yet; Balthazar always managed to find substantial evidence on the most obscure things for cases within hours. This wasn't even that obscure. There had to be some asshole person out there that sold their soul for somebody to die and then realized that that was a _bit_ too overdramatic for whatever silly, domestic issue they had with the person.

Dean hadn't showed up since before Gabriel's death, and he stilled prayed to him here and there, sought out the feeling of his mind working, the brief flashes of regret and anger that were the most common concerning him. He prayed to Adam, who naturally didn't answer either, probably instructed not to by Dean. He really wanted to tell Adam to get his head out of his ass and realize that it was his job to get Dean to get _his_ head out of _his_ ass, because him ignoring him for this long, certainly hearing the prayers and knowing how important the situation was, was surely a result of his head being shoved so far up his ass that it came out at the top again.

Honestly, he was scared, and the person who had made him less scared the last time something huge happened—when Gabriel disappeared—was Dean, and really, _only Dean._ Sure, Ash did a lot, and Balthazar, Bobby, Ellen, and Jo contributed to helping find Gabriel and keeping Castiel sane, but it was Dean that was there the most, with his angelic protection and his constant presence at least in the back of Cas's mind. That presence was fading.

"We should go on a case soon," he suggested eventually to his brothers, unable to stand being cooped up there any longer.

"No way," Gabriel said, looking up from the book he'd checked out from the library about demons and demonic rituals. Cas vaguely wondered how many librarians thought they were psychotic devil-worshipers—but then, why the hell did the public library have that section in the first place, then? There had to be a psychotic devil-worshiper on the library team that made that decision.

"Look, I'm not hurt or in pain or anything," Cas said, rolling his eyes. "But I am sick of this. We _can't_ undo the deal, and I really don't want to think about it while we don't have to, so can we please go on a case?"

Balthazar and Gabriel exchanged a look before Balthazar opened his mouth.

Castiel cut him off before he had a chance to say anything. "You can't stop me from going on my own," he said. He didn't want to, but he wasn't going to be stuck up in a motel room any longer while they searched for a way to help him out of the deal. There wasn't one, and he was sick of sitting around while they attempted to find out. Evading his death and sentence down to hell would only make Gabriel drop dead, and he couldn't let that happen.

"We know that," Balthazar said. "I was just going to tell you that we're thinking of calling Mom and asking her to help."

His eyes jerked up to his younger brother and he immediately shook his head. "She's dead," he said. "We discussed that."

"Yeah, but what if she's not? What if we ask Adam or Dean to look for her whenever they come?" Balthazar said. "What if we find her?"

He shook his head again and looked down. "They're not coming back, first of all. And she _is_ dead. Besides, what if you found her? Do you want to? After she's left us alone all this time? She can—" But he couldn't. He couldn't allow himself to think so low of the mother that had kept them alive when she was driven to find her husband's killer. He couldn't—she had only done what she knew was the right thing in the long run—he had no _right_ to say what she did was wrong. "Look, I just… She's better off without us, if she's still alive."

They looked at her for a second, both of them, shocked maybe by what he was about to say or what he did say or both. He stood up, wanting to leave, wanting to drive off and go on a case and get his mind off of everything that was swimming around up there, off of hell impending on him and his mother's abandonment of them—though he reasoned with himself that it was probably justified, somehow.

He wanted to get his mind off of Dean's abandonment of him. Where was he?

"I'm not gonna go on a case," he said when they gave protesting looks to him grabbing his keys to the Impala. "I just need to drive. Clear my head."

They gave him sympathetic, understanding looks, and he really wanted to strangle them because he _did not _need their pity, and he would have thought that they would stop giving it to him by then. Or that they'd still be angry, and maybe they were but not showing it, but he really would've preferred pissy coldness to this.

He walked out of the door before they said anything and went to where the Impala was parked. He sat in the driver's seat for a second, staring at the door to their motel. He wondered if this was what his mother did when she left: crawled into her car, stared at the motel door for a second, and then left. He wondered if she missed them. He wondered what she did when she left them. He wondered if she regretted it somewhere along the road but kept going.

He wondered if she was still keeping on going now, like his brothers said she might be.

He turned the key and drove out of the parking lot, letting the radio station that was on before play. He said he hated it, but now that he thought about it—and he would think of anything to get his mind off things—he was really fond of classic rock.

In the next second, everything stopped mattering because he was being _exploded_ by wave after wave after wave of pain, gasping and vaguely aware of flying off the road and maybe he wasn't even in the Impala anymore but all he knew was that _everything hurt_, but it was a hurt deep inside him like his very soul was throbbing with the pain, and he felt himself start to scream as it overwhelmed him.

He blacked out before he even knew what had happened.

* * *

When he woke up, he was in a motel, or no, definitely not a motel. He sat up and found that that wasn't a good idea at all, so he observed the room while lying down. It was very nice. Maybe he was in a hotel. He didn't know how he'd gotten there or what had happened that caused that horrible pain.

A second later, Dean was there, and suddenly he felt his absence. He had been able to feel that he was alive and the emotions he was dimly experiencing when he was in the Impala before, but now that he was right in front of him it was like he was dead. He cocked his head slightly and made a move to sit up, but Dean shook his head and went over to him.

"Just listen," he said gently, sitting on the bed and looking down at him. "When you sold your soul, that broke the bond. I was reluctant to return to you because I knew that it would sever our connection and that it was going to be extremely painful for both of us. I thought it might even be fatal, so I waited until I was prepared for the agony and to help you if it killed you."

"We're not connected anymore?" he said, frowning at him, and he couldn't even tell if he was lying because there was _nothing_, nothing but his own thoughts and feelings. He wanted to reach out to Dean, as if touching him and being close to him would bring it back. He wanted the extra person in his head again, wanted the comfort of being able to rely on Dean's stability for his own. He wanted to feel what he was thinking.

"No," he said softly. "We're not."

"Because I sold my soul," he said quietly. "Can you save me, Dean?"

He looked down at him like Cas was a like puppy, and at the same time Dean looked like a lost puppy himself, sad and pouty and also slightly frustrated. He shook his head. "No, I can't," he said, "not without killing Gabriel."

He sighed. "I don't want that to happen," he said quietly.

"I know you don't, Cas, which is why I'm not going to do that," he said. He looked down at him and away again, staring at the wall like there was some interesting detail about it that Castiel couldn't comprehend with his human senses. He pulled the blanket up around him, wanting to go over and be hugged but pushing that away because it was beyond ridiculous. He knew that htat wouldn't bring back their connection, but his soul didn't.

"I'm sorry I sold my soul," he said, and he wasn't even sure why he was apologizing because he wouldn't apologize to Gabriel, Balthazar, or Bobby about it. But with Dean it was just natural for him to want to not hurt. He could read Dean very well, so used to matching what body language went with what emotion he was getting from his head, and he knew it well enough that even when he wasn't feeling anything very strongly. Dean was an angel, so he didn't have much body language other than about to be badass or awkward and cute—no, he did _not _just call him cute—but still. He was upset right now, Cas could tell.

"Don't apologize, Castiel," he said, shaking his head and looking back at him finally. "If I had a soul, I would have done the same for Sam."

He nodded slightly. Sam—the big/little brother that Dean had talked about before. He seemed more powerful than Dean, and Cas vaguely wondered if he could help him, but he dismissed the thought for now, because at the moment, there was Dean, and he just wanted to talk to him while he could. He didn't want to miss this opportunity to just relax with him, sure that there would be time to be serious with him later.

He realized that he'd already forgiven him for leaving him when he needed him so badly, just like that, just because he was Dean. He had so much effect on his life that it was almost scary, because at any time he could decide that he needed to be more loyal to the angels, and then he would be gone and Cas felt more and more dependent on Dean's continued presence, his visits here and there even if they were short.

He needed Dean. He cared about Dean.

This was so stupid. Dean was his best friend at most. He couldn't be thinking this way about his best friend, because he would never love him, never have him that way. He was an _angel_ too, which didn't help that situation. He didn't have feelings for Dean. He didn't.

He thought this over and over as he sat up, despite Dean's protests, and moved toward him, hugging him tightly, closing his eyes and leaning his head forward to partially bury his face in the angel's shoulder. After a moment, he felt Dean's arms sliding around him slowly, mirroring the hug that they'd had before at Bobby's, the one that almost made him think he liked Dean—but no, he didn't, couldn't. All of that had to be fabricated, all of those emotions because of the bond that made him want to feel Dean's happiness constantly. This hug was less intense, almost affectionate, loving but surely in a brotherly way, and he soaked it up.

"Are you okay?" Dean asked after a long pause, but he didn't move away from him. Snapped away from his stupor of just melting away in Dean's arms, Cas realized that he was now leaning against the angel, his arms holding him in place and his hand slowly moving up and down on his back, relaxing Cas so much that he didn't even think moving away was an option. He didn't know exactly in what way Dean wanted to know if he was okay, but right then, he was okay in all ways, so he nodded, and Dean continued to rub his back and Cas found his eyes sliding shut.

When he woke up, Dean was still there, and he was so happy that he hadn't left that for a second he didn't realize that he was lying down, and Dean was too, and they were full on _cuddling._ For a long time he continued to pretend he was still asleep, and maybe Dean knew he wasn't because he wasn't an angel, but if he didn't then that was better for Cas. He didn't know what to do. He didn't know if he should pull away, didn't know if he should just stay in Dean's arms. He didn't want to hurt Dean's feelings if he pulled away, and he kind of liked being coddled by Dean, but then—_no. _No. He couldn't cuddle Dean. He couldn't snuggle up next to him and close his eyes and fall asleep in the protection and warmth and comfort of his arms around him, knowing when he opened his eyes that Dean's vibrant green ones would be there and he would talk and help him and reassure him.

No. He couldn't do any of that. That was ridiculous.

Why he stayed in Dean's arms when he opened his eyes, he didn't know, but that was what happened.

"I'm sorry," Dean said, but he didn't move either. Maybe he felt that he was uncomfortable. It took Cas a second to remind himself that Dean couldn't feel what Cas was feeling anymore. "You fell asleep like this and I thought you would be more comfortable lying down, so I did, and I didn't want to wake you, so I just stayed. Is that okay?"

"Yeah, uh…" He nodded slightly, not wanting to say anything, not trusting what would come out of his mouth.

He suddenly remembered something from before, something he didn't want to bring up right then but knew he needed to. He let out a puff of breath and reburied his face in Dean's shoulder so he was less likely to move away when Cas said this. He didn't know why he was so desperate for Dean to stay right there, but suddenly he was. He never wanted to leave him, and that thought scared him more than anything else now that the bond was gone and he had no real thing to blame it on—except that it was maybe lingering from before, that this was all fake and that he never would have felt anything like this before if they had never had a bond.

He pushed this away and said, his voice slightly muffled by Dean's shirt and shoulder, "Why did you give the Colt to Yellow Eyes?"

"Oh," he said quietly. He sighed, and Cas felt Dean's face against his head—felt his _lips_ there, and suddenly he had no clue what to do because oh hell was Dean _kissing his head?_ But he didn't move, just sat there, maybe too shocked to move. "Look, Cas, it's part of the bigger plan. You've got to believe me when I say I didn't want to at all, but I was forced to. It was that or risk falling, and I can't. I know that we have more angels on our side, but you actually can't ask me to do that. I can't believe Adam asked me to, but I think he was just angry with me."

"Okay," he said quietly, looking up at him. He frowned. "Did you kiss my head?"

Dean frowned back at him. "No," he said. "I put my face there."

"Okay," he said. "Because—no."

He frowned even more, and Cas dreaded whatever conversation he was about to have to have to explain human things to Dean. "But you're okay with hugging me and me holding you?" he asked him.

"Yes," he said. "I—I don't know. Kissing is just off-limits, okay?"

He stared at Castiel for a second before asking, "Are you going to let me hold you often now?"

He sighed and looked up at him. "I don't now, Dean, it's complicated," he said. "It isn't really acceptable to just cuddle with someone when you're not dating them, and we're not dating."

He didn't want to know if Dean wanted to. He_ did not_ want to know.

He badly wanted to know.

This was all so stupid. He was so annoyed with himself and with Dean and the stupid green eyes that were staring at him that belonged to the stupid body that had the stupid arms that were around him and the stupid Dean that was inside the body and his stupid personality that went along with it. He was so angry with all of that, anything to do with all of that, that he just wanted to get up and be done with the conversation and situation and just—just—what? There was nowhere he wanted to be more than there, and that only made him angrier.

"Cas," he said, watching him. Cas pulled himself close to Dean and shut his eyes. "Are you okay still?"

"No. I'm angry," he said quietly.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I wish I could still feel that."

"It's my fault that you can't," he said. He didn't look up at him, though he felt like Dean wanted him too. He didn't really move at all, but stayed with his eyes closed.

He felt Dean shaking his head rather than saw it. "What are you angry about?"

"I'm…" There was no point in lying or not telling him, even if Dean couldn't feel what he was thinking anymore. It was just Dean, and he felt like he could tell Dean anything. "I'm angry because I'm going to die in a year but I don't want to change that because if being saved means Gabriel dying then I don't want to be saved. At all. And I'm angry that because I'm gonna die in a year… it's not—it's not good that I…" He finally opened his eyes, not sure what to say.

"Cas," he said, and that was all Dean said, because before either of them knew what was going on their lips were pressed together, both of them having leaned in without thought, without considering what it meant that they were just going to kiss, and Cas realized that he knew so much about Dean without knowing anything at all, and he was kissing this practical _stranger _that he still understood in so many ways, and he never wanted to pull away.

Unfortunately, they did soon pull away, mostly because Dean was an absolutely _horrible_ kisser, his lips frozen and shut tightly and puckered way too much. Though Cas tried, he couldn't hold back a smile and a chuckle, and he cupped the back of Dean's neck, pulling him close and whispering when their lips were almost touching, "Here, I'll show you."

He did show Dean, who was a remarkably quick learner, and by the time that he got the hang of it and they had been making out for a while, they were both closer than ever, limbs entangled and Cas found that anything that was holding him back from being together with him before seemed _ridiculous_, because it was Dean, and that was about the best thing you could be for Cas, the only thing that Cas ever wanted.

"Kissing is not off-limits anymore, is it?" Dean asked, genuinely wanting to know it seemed.

He smiled at him and gave him another brief kiss as an answer, and then said, "No, it's not."

"I don't…" Dean paused for a second, looking at Cas. He seemed to be searching for the words he wanted to use. "I don't know how to do a relationship."

"That's okay," he said. He didn't really expect him to, since he was a million-or-so-year-old virgin. Dating experience didn't really fit into that. "You'll learn, hopefully."

"We only have a year," he said, voice quiet and sounding sad and annoyed at the same time. "Castiel, I don't… I've never felt like this before. I don't understand it."

He studied his face for a moment, the freckles that dotted the vessel's face, the eyes that were startlingly and beautifully green, the pink and very kissable lips. His vessel was no doubt handsome, but Cas realized he found something more than the way he looked in the most physical of ways to be attractive. The way he _was_, how he occupied the body he took up, the words and motions and the way he used the face that he took.

He pulled himself out of his distracted gazing only to be pulled back in when he realized that these weren't new feelings. He didn't just suddenly want to kiss Dean. He just had to pull his head out of his ass. As it turned out, Dean wasn't the only one skilled in the art of getting heads stuck in asses.

"I know," he said quietly, to both things Dean said. He didn't want to hurt Dean, and he didn't have time to show Dean a long relationship. Cas would be dead in a blink of an eye to him. That thought scared him, because he would be _dead_, in _hell_. He tried to push it away, and only managed to delay the thoughts for the time being. "I'm sorry. We probably shouldn't. It isn't fair to you."

"No, Cas, I want to know," he said. "I want to know what I'm feeling, I want to know what this is, I want… I want you. I—I think I'm falling."

He raised an eyebrow. "You're… falling? In love? With me?" he said, but before he could really process it and get panicked about that, Dean shook his head, and he was more disappointed than he thought he would've been panicked.

"No. I think I'm falling from heaven," he whispered. He sounded as scared about this as Cas felt about hell, so Cas leaned forward and hugged him. Dean hugged him back tightly, practically clinging to him. "I think they know that I spend so much time with you, that I defy them for you."

"Then don't," he said, and as much as it broke his heart to be saying this, he continued. "If they're going to rip your grace out because of me, then I don't want you to risk being with me. At the very least, I don't want you to risk being together with me."

"Cas," he said, pulling away from the hug enough to look at him, and his green eyes were full of pain that felt foreign to him. Sure, he'd known Dean to be in pain like this before, but not so much, not this way. It was different. It was… more human.

"No," he said, driven by a new resolve now that he was almost sure that Dean was falling, just because of that look that was like a punch in the gut to him. "If this were any other time or any other circumstance, then I would jump at the idea of being with you, Dean, but if you're going to fall I don't want to. And I don't… I don't have _time._"

He looked at him for a second before nodding. "You're right," he said.

"And…" He swallowed, because he didn't really want to know this. "Would you even have these feelings if you weren't falling?"

He frowned at him. "I don't know," he said. "Yes, actually, I think so. There was… _something_ there before, but I ignored it because I wasn't falling."

"Okay," he said. "Okay, because… yeah."

He was reluctant to move away from him, reluctant to make this decision. He hated the situation desperately. If it really were any other time and any other circumstance, he was sure he would be happy to be with Dean. All of his bullshit about _what if the feelings are fabricated by the bond—_well, he was still kind of scared of that, but he was almost sure now that they weren't, that that was just something he was saying to himself to convince himself not to follow through with what he was feeling.

He was just honestly so confused.

He didn't move away, but he did decide to move on to more serious things. "I have a few things I need to talk to you about," he said.

Dean nodded slightly. "Okay," he said.

"First of all, Sam—that brother of yours. Would he be powerful enough to help me with my deal?" he said.

He looked at him sadly. "Maybe a little bit," he said, "but I doubt we could find him anyway."

"Okay," he said, and he pushed that disappointment away quickly, not wanting to dwell on it and definitely not wanting to talk about it anymore. "And another thing. There was a light at the graveyard that pushed Azazel away, and Gabriel said there was also a person that erased most of his memories of his time at Cold Oak. I don't know what that's about."

He frowned slightly. "Describe the light."

"It was bright—like, painfully bright—and white, and it hit Azazel or Yellow Eyes or whatever and then disappeared," he said.

"It was an angel," he said. "But there were angels there to make sure things went as planned. That interference wouldn't have been allowed."

"Which angel could it have been?" he said.

"At the very least a Seraph like me, but I doubt any of the others would," he said. "And the only archangels are John, Michael, Lucifer, and Samuel," he said. "But John is working for Michael for this big plan, and Lucifer is obviously in the Cage."

"So it was Sam," he said. "It had to be Sam. He's alive."

The smallest of smiles appeared on Dean's face and he nodded. "He has to be," he said quietly. "I knew he was." He moved to sit up and it seemed like he was going to disappear, before he seemed to remember Cas and he looked down at him. "Your Impala. When the bond broke, you veered off the road and I brought you here. I brought the car here too. As far as I know, it's okay. Would you rather look for Sam with me or drive back to Bobby's house?"

He wanted to go with Dean, badly, but he knew that with him falling that was the last thing he needed to do. Plus, a big search for Dean's brother that would take who knows how long didn't seem like the best idea when they were trying not to be together. All that time alone with Cas having to sleep and Dean maybe cuddling up next to him and them going out to eat together when Cas had to eat and then probably holding hands and kissing in the motel rooms—no. They couldn't do that, but that was what it would lead to. He couldn't be the cause of Dean falling from heaven. He couldn't leave his brothers for so long when he had so little time left with them.

"I want to go with you," he said quietly, "but I can't. I'm sorry."

He shook his head. "It's best that way probably," he said, but he looked like he really wanted for Cas to come with him. He sighed, and started to consider it again. Like really consider it. Like, within seconds, he found himself opening his mouth to say _never mind, hell yes, I'll come with you_, but he forced himself not to. "I… Goodbye."

"Dean, wait," he said, and it was probably the stupidest thing he was ever going to do. "Why don't I… I'll drive back to Bobby's, and then tomorrow you come get me and I'll look with you for a week or so. But then I've gotta go back with my brothers."

He smiled at him slightly. "Zachariah can't get angry at me for that if you're helping look for the lost archangel," he said.

"Okay," he said, and he felt himself smiling too, despite how idiotic they were both being. The last thing they needed to do was go off together for a week.

God, he was excited to go off with him for a week.

* * *

**So. I think you can see what I mean when I say that none of this chapter was supposed to happen. Like...? They weren't supposed to get together for like... twenty more chapters? And then. This.**

**And then the part where they decide to go away was _not_ supposed to happen and totally turns the plot completely upside down and to be honest the only reason I'm keeping it in here is because _destiel road trip eeeee._ So yeah. Part two was only supposed to be thirteen chapters but I think it'll be more like fourteen or fifteen now._  
_**


	15. Chapter 15

**Agh, how has it already been two weeks since I updated? Most of this chapter just flew out of me pretty easily, but then when I got to the last thousand words, I was stuck, and I think I just kept telling myself, it's only been five days, it's only been a week... But now here it finally is.**

* * *

_The last thing they needed to do was go off together for a week._

_God, he was excited to go off with him for a week._

* * *

When he called his brothers to make sure they were at Bobby's, he was bombarded with questions. "Where the _hell_ have you been?" was the first one, snapped by Bobby himself. He seemed to have stolen the phone from Balthazar before he could get a word out. Cas tried to speak, but Bobby continued on. "We thought you were _dead_, Cas. We thought they took you earlier, or some of Yellow Eyes's demons weren't happy that you killed him. We were _terrified._"

He probably should've called them instead of sitting in Dean's arms, teaching him how to make out. But Dean was _good_ at making out, once he learned, so he found himself only feeling half as sorry as he should have.

"Bobby, I can explain as soon as I get there," he said. "I'm almost to Sioux Falls now."

He was really more like an hour or two away, but if he didn't stop and he drove a little to recklessly, he could probably make it in an hour.

"You'd better be," he snapped. "We want the full story."

"The full story is—yeah, just wait," he said. He wasn't sure if he was going to tell them about kissing Dean, especially since they decided not to be together because of circumstances. But then again, with them going off together, it was kind of inevitable for them not to kiss again.

* * *

Back at Bobby's, his brothers and Bobby were waiting up for him, despite the fact that it was late now that he was there. They all had beers in hand. He realized that only he and Bobby were old enough to legally drink, which was weird. He was so used to seeing Gabriel and Balthazar with drinks in hand that it didn't seem like they were too young, although in other things he was very aware of their ages.

They were expectantly staring at him as he took his jacket off and made his way over to get a beer for himself before telling them the story. He ignored the feeling of their eyes all glaring at him. It hadn't been entirely his fault, because he was pretty out of it when he first woke up and then fell asleep in Dean's arms. When he was making out with Dean rather than worrying about Gabriel and Balthazar, that was when it was more his fault.

He took a seat in the kitchen with the three of them. As he opened his beer, he started his explanation with: "Dean and I don't have the bond anymore."

Balthazar was basically the only one that was surprised. Gabriel looked confused, and Cas remembered that he didn't know about the bond that he and Dean shared. Bobby was expressionless, waiting to here the bigger story. If he had thought Balthazar or Gabriel were dead and in hell and it turned out that they had just been preoccupied, he would be pretty angry too. He didn't know if his story was going to erase any of the anger or not.

"So apparently selling my soul set something off in his grace that told it to break the bond, and he knew that it would be really painful and might kill me, so he waited until he was ready to help if something went wrong," he said. "I was driving when he came, and I veered off the road because I couldn't think, and the next thing I know I'm in some hotel room. Dean's there, and I don't really know what to do or what's going on, so... okay, don't you dare laugh, but we hugged and I... fell asleep. Like that. In his arms. I was way out of it after waking up the first time."

He paused for a breath and looked at the three faces. Bobby and Balthazar looked varying amounts of amused, and Gabriel looked extremely confused. They would really have to dedicate a day or so to catching him up on things, from the angels to werewolves giving them cryptic messages about them being at the center of things, to their mom getting Jo's dad killed.

Cas needed to talk to Jo about things. He made a note to self to do so.

He decided to continue before Bobby or Balthazar could make some remark and before Gabriel could ask a question. "So when I woke up, I guess Dean got confused, or I dunno, whatever, but he thought the best option was to stay with me, so I woke up—"

"Wait, hang on," Balthazar interrupted, and Cas badly wanted to tell him to shut up and move on, but he knew that if he told them all the full truth that there would be ridicule anyway, and likely protests about him going off alone with Dean to find Samuel, but that was the best option and they could've convince him otherwise. Part of him, admittedly, did just want to go because of the idea of a road trip with his almost-but-not-really boyfriend, but also, they needed to find Samuel.

"So you fell asleep in his arms, and woke up _cuddling_?" Balthazar said, raising an eyebrow at him through a grin.

"Yes, Balthazar, shut up. So we talk for a little bit about Gabriel and Cold Oak and I tell him about that light that was there, and basically we figured out that the archangel Samuel has been protecting Gabriel." He looked at his brother. "Dean said it was Samuel that had to have erased your memories at Cold Oak."

Gabriel frowned slightly, his confusion only growing, and thankfully everyone stayed quiet, because he wanted to get this last stretch of story over with as quickly as possible.

"So... then... well, we kissed," he said, and Cas could feel a dark, warm blush rise to his cheeks and he refused to look at anyone, staring determinedly down at his beer and fiddling with it slightly as he went on quickly, so as not to allow any of them to have time to say anything. But he could practically feel their incredulity.

"Also," Cas continued on, "Dean is falling. Because of me, mostly. So with that going on with him, and my soul being sold and my days limited, we've decided nothing's going to come of the kiss. But we're going to go look for Samuel together for a week—alone_._"

He finally glanced up, and their faces were all mixtures of interest, amusement, and frustration. He knew that the frustration must have been toward the fact that he was going off with Dean alone.

Bobby finally spoke up, and Cas probably could've predicted that he was going to say something that Cas had no interest in listening to, and if he would've, he would've been absolutely right. "You're not going off with him," he said dismissively, standing up and walking into the other room like that was that, but it wasn't. Bobby couldn't stop him from doing this.

"Look, you're all so keen on getting me saved," he said. "Well, if Samuel's protecting Gabriel, he may be interested in helping me, and having an archangel on my side would be a big advantage."

"Compared to two fuckup angels, one of which is falling, yes, but you have no way to be sure that he's not going to smite you on the spot," Bobby snapped at him, glancing back in the room. He was _mad._ Cas wasn't even entirely sure why. He was safe, back with them, and he would have Dean's protection when he went off with them. They were completely ridiculous.

"Dean's not a fuckup," he said, rolling his eyes slightly.

"You just think that because you want to fuck him," Gabriel said, grinning at him.

Cas looked at him and glared. "No. I actually believe that he's not a fuckup, because he's _not._"

"Adam isn't either," Balthazar spoke up.

"He isn't," Castiel agreed, looking at his brother. "He's… well, he's smart, honestly."

"Exactly," Balthazar said.

Bobby shook his head almost disbelievingly. "You've got to be kidding me."

Cas turned to him, eyes narrowed and brow creased. "Look, I appreciate that you want to help, want to make sure I'm okay, all that. But you can't stop me from going," he said.

"We just want to—" Cas didn't care what Gabriel had to say. He didn't want to hear more of their stupid reasoning. He was going to go whether they liked it or not. He wanted to get Samuel. After all, even if he couldn't help him, he was definitely happy to help Gabriel, and he wanted for there to be someone as powerful as an archangel to protect his little brother after he was gone.

_Gone._ He pushed that word away. He didn't like it.

"_Don't,_" he snapped. He had almost said _I don't care_, but he didn't want to be that rude. He turned away from them. "I just wanted to tell you guys. Have a day with you before I leave for a week. I'm going to go now, though."

He went for the door, but he heard someone walking up behind him and turned to see Balthazar there. "Can we talk outside?"

"I don't really think there's much of a chance you'll accept me saying no, so sure," he said, turning again and walking out, Balthazar following him.

Outside, he went over to the Impala and leaned up against it. Balthazar leaned against it next to him, and Cas closed his eyes, preparing himself for the inevitable lecture that would spew from Balthazar's mouth and he would mostly disregard. He was angry too, at the demons for killing Gabriel, at the angels for not helping him now that he'd sold his soul despite his apparent "importance," at his brothers and Bobby for not understanding that he just wanted to help them, to attempt to help himself. At the world for not letting him and Dean get a fair chance at the _something_ that was between them.

He didn't know what he was the angriest about, but the thing that was at the top of his mind was the last one.

Balthazar let out a breath. "You're being an ass," he said, looking over at him.

Cas raised an eyebrow. "Seriously? Whatever, Balth, I'm leaving."

He shook his head. "No, Castiel, I mean it. You're being a major dick," he said. "Gabriel—Gabriel went through _a lot of shit_, most of which he doesn't even _remember_, at Cold Oak, and Bobby's practically a dad to you, and I've been here with you this whole time. So, yeah. It's not Gabe's fault that he's clueless and just wants to save you and be with you. And it's not Bobby's fault that he thinks you're an idiot because you're choosing these angels over us. And for God's sake, Cas, I just lost Jess. I don't want to lose you too."

He didn't look at his brother anymore. He looked over at the shiny blackness of the Impala, at the grass and the old cars and the house. Anywhere but Balthazar. He didn't have anything to say to any of that for a few minutes, but Balthazar didn't press. He let it sit.

All he could muster was a simple "I'm sorry." And then he realized how stupid that was, so he albeit pretty reluctantly, let what he was thinking—what he was _feeling_—spill. "I'm just—scared, I think, and I don't want to… I don't want to leave you guys. I don't want to leave Dean."

"Why's everything all about Dean, Cas?" he said. "We need you the most."

He finally glanced over at him. "'Cause he's my Jess, man, or he could be."

* * *

It was definitely the "he's my Jess" line that got Balthazar off his back, but Castiel meant it entirely. He didn't just say it to get his brother to let him go. After he said it, Balthazar nodded, reminded him to call and be careful, and left from the side of the Impala with a goodbye. Cas leaned up against the car, figuring Dean would want to fly them places rather than have them drive in the car.

_I know it's early but I'm ready to go,_ he thought to him.

Dean was there quickly. He was wearing different clothes than usual. Rather than the simple green shirt and jeans that he usually wore, he looked almost like he'd raided Cas's wardrobe. He was wearing a black shirt underneath a flannel, and over the flannel was a reddish-brown leather jacket. Rather than the tennis shoes he usually wore, he was wearing boots that Cas would approve of.

Castiel couldn't help but smile. "Are you trying to match me?" he asked.

Dean cocked his head slightly, which was completely adorable and Cas didn't even try to not think it was anymore, because it _totally_ was. "You and Balthazar are always wearing similar clothes, so I thought it was just what hunters wore," he said. "Like a uniform."

He shook his head. "No, we don't have a uniform," he said. He smiled more and went closer to him, but not too close, because while he was certain that they wouldn't be able to restrain themselves for the entire week, he wasn't going to crack immediately. "Where to first?"

"There are signs that he may be in Vermont," he said, "although I'm not sure why he would be in Vermont of all places."

"Does seem weird," he agreed. "To Vermont?"

Dean nodded. "To Vermont."

Instead of placing his hand on his shoulder or arm as he usually did before taking off in flight, Dean took Cas's hands, and before they were transported to the next place, he could feel fingers lacing with his. He regretted that time didn't slow down while their hands were entwined for him like it slowed down for Dean, especially since as soon as they landed the hand was gone and his own was left feeling cold, like having Dean's there was a part of him that had always been there and needed to remain.

They were in the middle of a small town, no discernible buildings in sight. Rows and rows of houses all spread far apart with massive yards containing pools and children's little playgrounds sprawled out in front of them. A light rain was starting to fall over the town, and the children that were out bouncing on their trampolines or paddling through their kiddy pools all screeched as the cold droplets hit them. They ran inside, calling for friends and siblings to follow.

Castiel looked over at Dean. "Why would Samuel be here?" he asked him. Cas didn't even think he could handle an apple pie life in a place like this. If he was ever going to settle down, he'd do it in the city. There would always be enough going on that he wouldn't get bored. Out in the middle of small towns, there would be nothing but boring, pointless, domestic gossip. At least in the city he could still go on cases here and there, run-of-the-mill spirits or witches or vamps.

"I have no idea," Dean said, surveying the area slowly, using whatever special angelic powers his vessel's eyes now held to scan the place for any signs of their archangel. Cas got the slight feeling that Dean didn't know if Samuel was actually there, but he couldn't tell. He didn't _know._ The absence where the presence of Dean's grace used to be felt heavier than usual. Instead of bursting with Dean's certainty or uncertainty, there was an emptiness that felt unbearable.

After a moment, Dean let out a sigh and started walking down the street. Cas had seen him walk through rain and wind before, and it never seemed to do anything to him. He went on like nothing, oblivious to the coldness and wetness. But now, Cas noticed, he was shivering—only slightly, and only occasionally, but it was a sign that falling was affecting him. That was Cas's fault.

A car started to come down the street, and Dean seemed to think that it was their job to move out of his way, so Cas grabbed his hand quickly and tugged him out of the street and onto the sidewalk. He smiled, dropping his hand, unsure if Dean would want him to keep holding it.

"You have to be on the sidewalk, dork," he said.

He looked down at the ground, as if to match the word sidewalk with a sidewalk. "Oh," he said. He looked up at Castiel again. "I think I miscalculated. Vermont probably isn't the place where Samuel is."

"Probably not, buddy," he agreed.

* * *

The first day involved a lot of checking out tiny towns in Vermont, New York, New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. Dean suggested they try Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New Jersey too, but Cas ruled out anything even remotely north for the day and said, "Why don't we go to Florida?"

Dean cocked his head in the cute way that he did. "I know that Samuel is not in Florida."

"Well, it's probably not raining on some Florida beach right now, and I want to be warm and eat at some diner next to the ocean," he said. "Sounds like a road-trippy thing to do. And this is a road trip."

Dean smiled at him slightly. "You're very weird," he said. "But all right, I suppose it is time to feed you and get you somewhere to sleep."

"Dude, it sounds like I'm your pet when you put it that way," he said, rolling his eyes at him, although it was good-natured. Dean probably didn't know this, however, being angelic and all, but he didn't seem to be offended either.

They flew to Florida and went to some fancy beachside restaurant. Dean flicked through the menu and ordered something, mostly so it didn't look weird, but also because he said he wanted to try the food. There was no need for him to eat, so he probably hadn't before other than pie and things that he ate with the Novaks.

They were slightly secluded from others, so they talked freely about their case. Dean told Castiel about the last time he saw Sam in more detail than Cas had heard the story before, and Castiel described the light as best he could as Dean drilled him. They knew it was Samuel, so Cas was confused as to why he would be so interested in the exact shade of bluish-white the grace had been.

"I just want to know if he's hurt or not," he said. "If he's been hiding out, that would explain why."

"Or maybe he's in trouble," Castiel suggested as she shoved a fry into his mouth and took a drink of his soda. Dean picked at his sandwich, seemingly uninterested in it. He had said it tasted like "molecules" and that he didn't feel like making the effort to search for its actual flavor.

"That's a possibility," he said. He sighed and leaned his head against the window that they were sitting next to. Cas felt like he could count every freckle on his face, the sunlight that was filtering through the window putting a spotlight on each one. He smiled slightly, and he wasn't even really sure why. Maybe it was being with Dean. He felt… good. Calm. Happy.

It was strange. It was foreign. It was scary.

* * *

They searched what felt like everywhere, finding no signs of Samuel, and Dean seemed more and more worried that he was losing more of his angelic powers, although he didn't seem to be showing any outward signs. By the third day, Cas wanted to take Dean into his arms and hug him tightly and tell him that things would be okay, because he just seemed so stressed. It wasn't the bond that wanted him to keep Dean happy now. It was all him, all Cas's own mind.

That night, after they flew here and there and everywhere all over again, they settled in a motel in Houston and Cas got in bed to go to sleep. He couldn't, thoughts lingering in his mind that prevented him from keeping his eyes shut. Eventually, he opened them for good and sat up, looking around the room for Dean. He was at the little table of the motel, staring at the ceiling interestedly.

"I can't sleep," Cas admitted.

"I can make you sleep," Dean offered, looking over at him.

He shook his head and moved from the middle of the bed, patting the area next to him. Dean got up and went over to him, sitting next to him without a word. They were silent for what felt like hours, but blissful, comfortable hours. Finally, Cas moved and rested his head on Dean's shoulder. After maybe ten more minutes of quiet, Dean's arm slid around his waist and tugged him closer, and Cas felt warmer than he ever had in his entire life, heart swelling and thumping and aching.

"What are we doing?" he asked, though he knew that Dean wouldn't have an answer to that.

Suddenly he was engulfed in Dean, arms wrapping all the way around him and face buried in his shirt and body encased by his warmth. He breathed in Dean's scent, something like ozone and the Impala and rain. Dean didn't speak a word, but the action was enough to let Cas know. _We're using the time we have. We're being together. We're being stupid. We're falling in love._

It was terrifying, but it felt so good.

* * *

On the fifth day, just two days before the road trip would be declared a bust and Cas would be sent home, they were walking down the streets of Indianapolis. Cas was gazing idly at the Bankers Life Fieldhouse when he heard Dean gasp and move away from him. Cas looked at where he'd been and searched the crowd of people walking along the sidewalk—all toward the Fieldhouse, so there must've been something going on in there—and found that Dean had properly disappeared into the group. He huffed and pushed through the mob that he was now fighting against. "Dean!" he shouted.

After a few more moments of looking, he found Dean embracing a very tall man with longish brown hair. The man was hugging him back slightly too.

When they pulled away from the hug, Dean sent a smile at Cas. "This is Samuel," he said. "My brother."

Samuel nodded at him indifferently. "Look, Dean, you can't be around me," he said. "They can't make me fall, but they can make you fall."

Dean shook his head. "It's too late, little bro."

"I'm not your little brother," he said. He frowned slightly, just now catching the first part. "'Too late'? You're already falling?"

He nodded, sighing slightly. "There's, uh, there's not a lot I can do to prevent that." He glanced at Cas for just long enough that Cas barely caught it, but he did, and that finished the rest of that sentence for him. _There's not a lot I can do to prevent that—until Cas is gone and I no longer have the option to be with him._

Dean was choosing Castiel over his grace.

His heart swelled and sunk at the same time.

"Well, whatever that means, Dean," Samuel said, shaking his head. Something extended from his arm, and for a second, Castiel was confused. That lasted until he saw the silver, pointed end of an angel blade that was falling from the sleeve of his rumpled suit to his hand, where he caught it smoothly. The blade seemed to fit his hand perfectly, to be made for him, to embody him. It was longer than most.

"Put that away," Dean gasped as soon as he saw it, stepping forward.

Samuel shook his head and raised it, and Castiel's eyes widened. He stepped forward to protect Dean, assuming that Samuel was going to use the blade against him. He knew he didn't stand a chance against the archangel, but in the moment he panicked and was acting on impulse to protect Dean.

Samuel frowned at him slightly, head cocking, not unlike how Dean's head cocked when he was equally as confused. It wasn't cute when Samuel did it though. It was when Dean did, and only when he did it. Dean was just generally cute. He made a lot of non-cute things cute. Like being completely badass—he was really cute when he was doing that. Or being an awkward, clueless, angelic dork. He was literally the cutest when he was like that. Or cuddling Castiel, but that was generally cute anyway. Dean made it extra cute though. Dean was so _cute._

God, Cas was a fucking annoying little bastard and he needed to pull his head straight out of his godforsaken ass.

It was just that—well, Dean was _so cute._

"I have no intention of hurting him," Samuel told Castiel, before turning his attention back to his brother. "I want you to hold this for me. There are many angels after me, and I can't risk knowing where my blade is. No one will assume I have given it away, especially to someone that I haven't spoken with in years. If you want me to come out of hiding, you will do something with that for me."

Dean nodded. "Of course. You trust me?"

Samuel frowned slightly at him in confusion. "Yes, I trust you, Dean," he said. "You're my favorite brother."

Dean smiled widely and looked down, sliding the blade up into his sleeve, where it seemed to disappear after that.

"Wait, but why do you have to give Dean your blade to come out hiding?" Cas asked, too confused to think about the fact that he was ruining the brotherly moment that they were having for the first time in—millennia?

"It is the only thing that can kill me," Samuel said monotonously, as if it was part of a mantra that he didn't want to hear or say again for the rest of his impossibly long lifetime. "Archangels aren't affected by regular angel blades. Only their own. Sometimes there are certain things that are archangels' 'swords,' like how Michael's sword is—"

"_Sam,_" Dean said, stopping him. Samuel looked at him curiously but Dean just eyed Cas briefly and then looked back up at the taller angel.

"What's Michael's sword?" Cas asked, frowning between them. Sam opened his mouth to speak again, but Dean elbowed him and they seemed to have some sort of telepathic conversation. He yet again longed for the connection between himself and Dean so he could at least have an idea about how their conversation was going.

"Never mind," Sam said, shaking his head. "Anyway, I have been, uh, protecting Gabriel, and I would like to continue to do so, from your side of this war." He looked at Cas, and then at Dean again. "May I?"

For a moment, Dean looked taken aback, but then he smiled again, despite the newfound frustration and stress that had been thrown all over his face and eyes. He nodded slightly, and it seemed like he couldn't form any words, but he got his point across to Sam anyway.

"If you're on our side," Cas said slowly, feeling a bit selfish for bringing this up then, but he was scared and desperate and just needed to know, "can you, um, do me a pretty big favor?"

Dean and Samuel both looked at him, and Samuel nodded. "Yes, I think so, but I'm not guaranteeing anything."

"Well," he said, hoping more than anything else that Sam would be able to help him, would be able to keep him out of hell, soul intact, with Gabriel remaining alive, "um, I kind of sold my soul."

"Yes, I can see that," he said. He looked him over, hazel eyes narrowed slightly. "There is a mark on your soul."

He didn't like the thought of having some target painted on his back—or his soul, whatever—but he pressed on without mentioning that. "So I just… well, you're, like, the most powerful thing ever. So I was just thinking maybe you could help get me out of the deal."

"My Father is the most powerful being, rivaled only with Death I would assume, but anyway," he said, voice sounding really superior, as if Cas really was an idiot for not knowing that God and Death were far more powerful than Samuel, "I can't, unless you want me to get Gabriel killed, and seeing as I intend to protect him, that doesn't make a lot of sense."

"Oh," Cas said quietly. "Are you sure there's no way?"

"Well," he said after a moment of consideration, all of which Castiel was waiting patiently and anxiously at the same time, nervous and worried and just wanting to find out that _there was a way_, he didn't have to give up his brothers and Bobby and Dean, he didn't have to throw away all the what-ifs that he and Dean had brewing. "There might be, Castiel, but this has been anticipated for a long time. No angel in his right mind would interfere with your soul being sold."

Cas was confused for a second, because that didn't make sense any way he tried to twist it. Finally he just let it sink in how Samuel said it, and that implied all angels knew, all angels must've known there was no way to save Gabriel, all angels must've known he would sell his soul, all angels had foreseen that there was no way to save Castiel and that it was his destiny to rot in hell.

Adam was an angel.

Dean was an angel.

It was a like a punch in the face, and he desperately wanted Dean to speak up and say, _I didn't know, _but he just looked at Sam like he couldn't believe he'd said that, and that was enough confirmation for Cas. He felt sick. He wanted to go home. He wanted to be _away_ from Dean. He didn't want to process it completely when he was that close to Dean. He wanted someone to talk to him about it as it sunk in, and he couldn't do that with Dean anymore, and certainly not Sam.

"Please take me home," he said, voice tight but still giving away how betrayed and upset he felt.

"Cas, please," he said quietly.

"Don't call me Cas," he said, and it was barely above a whisper, and he _just wanted to go home._ And he didn't even really know why it was suddenly home, but home was with Balthazar and Gabriel and Bobby, and anywhere that Dean wasn't. He wanted to go to them, away from Dean, away from Dean, far away from Dean. "Please, _please_, just take me home."

Dean stood with his mouth open to say more for a second, before looking at Samuel. "I'll be back in a moment." He stepped forward, went to take Cas's hand, but he yanked it out of the way before he could, instead placing in on Dean's shoulder. Dean nodded, knowing he deserved this, before flapping his great wings that Cas could neither see nor hear, and then they were at Bobby's.

He stepped away from him. "Don't fucking come back. No, _don't._ You _knew_ the whole time, and you pretended like you could help! Get out of my face, Dean. I don't _ever_ want to see you again."

The hurt across Dean's face made another ache sprout inside him, but he ignored it, pretended it felt good to see him in pain because of everything he had made him go through, but it didn't. It made things worse. The only real relief came when he flew away, but somehow, that hurt too.


	16. Chapter 16

I **hope everyone had aa merry Christmas/happy holidays!**

* * *

_The only real relief came when he flew away, but somehow, that hurt too._

* * *

Castiel tried to avoid all mention of Dean after finding out that Dean _knew_ about the whole soul-selling and Gabriel dying and let it happen. After a couple days, though, Bobby, Balthazar, and Gabriel noticed that something was up about him. He was irritated, he was sad, he drank a little more than usual. Somehow he even managed to avoid confrontation from his brothers and surrogate dad for a day after they started trying to talk to him, but finally he was cornered, and he had no excuses.

It was Gabriel, which made it worse, because he hadn't told any of them about Samuel yet, and he knew he needed to. Samuel was, for some reason, trying to protect Gabriel, and he probably deserved to know that.

Okay, _definitely_ deserved to know that.

hBut Cas wasn't ready, and he couldn't express that he wasn't ready without alerting them exactly how messed up it all was, and even though he knew he was going to have to spill some of it, he sure as hell didn't intend on spilling all of it.

Gabriel was coming closer, stalking nearer to him like Cas was an animal of prey, alive with _good intentions_ and _just wanting to know what's up._ Cas shrunk back into the seat he was sitting in, all too aware of the fact that he was more and more trapped the longer he sat there. The last second for him to hop up and say he needed to piss came and went, and then Gabriel was sat at the table with him, looking at him with those golden baby eyes.

"What?" Cas said, too innocently. He should've gone for gruffness, not innocence. When did innocence _ever_ work?

I Gabriel rolled his eyes at him, seeing straight through it. "Cas, what are you doing?" he said, voice far too concerned to belong to his littlest brother. It was Cas's job to worry over the eighteen-almost-nineteen-year-old.

No. Wait. Nineteen-year-old. Gabriel had turned nineteen a week ago. After thinking about it for a second, Cas realized that he'd turned nineteen the day that Cas had sold his soul for him. They hadn't done anything for his birthday yet, or he hadn't at least. Maybe all the others had, and he was just the dick that had forgotten about it. He was twenty-three, Gabriel was nineteen, and Balthazar was almost twenty-one.

He pushed that away, not wanting to dwell on how much of an asshole he was being because then he'd probably end up spilling everything out to redeem himself, and that was the last thing he wanted to do, even if it would make him less of an asshole.

"I'm not doing anything," he said, not attempting to be innocent anymore.

"Everyone knows that something's up, and you know that everyone knows," Gabriel said, irritated, and Cas risked a glance up at his brother to see that he was beyond ticked off. Cas really should've given him _something_, should've at least muttered _Dean and I are fighting, I don't want to talk about it_, but he sat there wordlessly.

"Fucking _hell_, Castiel, can you please not pretend I'm some fragile, useless little kid? I'm sick of not knowing things, I'm sick of being behind with whatever's going on with you and Dean, and I'm sick of being treated like I'm an idiot because I'm the youngest. So fucking what, man? Look, it seems like some serious shit has gone on, and Balthazar has filled me in on everything, and it sounds like you've been jackass of the year. Look, I don't remember everything, okay, but I went through a lot of crap, and for God's sake, man, Jess just _died_, and Balthazar's been yanked back into the life when he had a chance to stay out of it. Give us a break. We're willing to talk about it, and I don't understand why you always have to ball everything up and continue on with this bullshit mission Mom sent us on."

It looked like Gabriel wanted to say _more_, and that was the last thing that Cas wanted, so he stood up and slammed his beer down on the table as hard as he could without breaking the bottle. "Fuck the hell off." He didn't _care_ right then, and he spun away.

…

He stayed cooped up in his room for the rest of the night and fully intended on doing the same for the rest of the day when Bobby came up and knocked on his door, saying, "They're going on a case. Figured you'd wanna go too."

Cas contemplated pretending like he was asleep and skipping it, but after a second he said he'd be out there soon, and stood, getting dressed and stuffing his bag. He slung it over his shoulder, waved to Bobby as he went out, and made his way to the Impala. Balthazar was waiting in the passenger's seat, and Gabriel was lying in the back seat with a blanket pulled over him, indicating that he was going to sleep the whole way.

"Where to?" he asked.

"There are demonic omens in Keene, Vermont," Balthazar said. His voice was calm, and he didn't look over at Cas. Maybe he was angry with him too. Scratch that—Cas _knew_ he was angry with him too. Everyone was.

"Vermont. Fucking great," he muttered, starting the car and turning on the music. Classic rock was very nice, actually, because it was loud and had words and was easy to sing along with. Perfect for not thinking, not talking, and drowning conversations that should've been happening but were definitely being avoided. He was becoming very attached to having Journey or Aerosmith or anything else that Gabriel liked blaring from the speakers of his car.

"What's wrong with Vermont?" Balthazar asked after reaching over and turning the music down. That annoyed Cas, but he didn't say anything about it or turn it back up. He needed to stop avoiding it, and honestly, what Gabriel had said really made him think—and hurt. Jess _had_ just died, and Balthazar _had_ just given up his only chance at getting out of the life.

"Nothing," he said unconvincingly. He sighed.

"Cassie," Balthazar said, looking over at him, "please talk to me. I'm sick of all of this. I just want to get it out before we really start to hate each other."

He looked over at him too for a second, before staring back out at the road. "Dean and I had a really good time," he said, looking out at the road. "First place we went was Vermont. Then we went to Florida that night, and we ate out and got a motel—" When Balthazar pulled a face, Cas smiled slightly, shaking his head. "Not like that, man. We just got a motel. And the next day we searched again. And it was like that every day, and it was just nice, to have him there, to know he wasn't going to leave because he was my ride."

He paused for a second, thinking over the five days of the trip, all up to the last half hour of the fifth day, when things turned to shit. He would've thought that it would've made the whole road trip that much better when they found Samuel, but he ruined everything.

"And then we found Samuel," he said. He sighed slightly. "But it wasn't great or anything. Dean was excited, and he told us about how he was the bright light that saved us, and he was the one that wiped Gabe's memory, and I probably should've asked about that, but I didn't. Anyway, he wants to protect Gabriel, for some reason. Again, shoulda asked, but I didn't."

"Did you ask about your soul?" Balthazar said.

He nodded. "And… he said that all angels know not to mess with that. It's part of the plan, which meant Gabriel dying was part of the plan too. Dean knew the whole time."

Balthazar's face fell and he opened his mouth to spew some sympathetic crap, but Cas just shook his head. It was silent for a moment, before Cas said, "So we're not working with him anymore."

"No, of course not," he said, shaking his head. "I hate him. I _hate_ him, man."

"No, you don't," he said. "If you hated him, you wouldn't be this angry he betrayed you like that."

Cas was thoroughly done with the conversation. He turned the music up, and though he knew he'd be pressed about the Samuel things more later, he was grateful that Gabriel was asleep and that Balthazar didn't press.

…

They stopped in the middle of Michigan for the night. As they ate, Cas briefly told Gabriel about the road trip, and he was justifiably pissed. "You just weren't going to tell me about the fact that there's an _archangel_ on my ass?" he snapped at him, keeping his voice low since the middle of a diner.

"Gabe, he and Dean… Look, okay, I'm not saying what he did was right, but I understand why he didn't want to talk about it, okay?" Balthazar said. He and Gabriel were on the same side of the booth, so Cas felt like he had a spotlight on him, with all their scrutiny and anger—or lack thereof, in Balthazar's case—pointed at him. For a moment Cas wondered why Balthazar wasn't angry, why he was sticking up for him, and then he remembered telling him that Dean was—or could be—his Jess.

He felt _sick_, remembering that now. He didn't want to be at the diner anymore. He wanted to get up and leave. But he knew his stomach and his brothers would protest.

"So you're saying I just shouldn't be mad?" Gabriel asked.

"No, I'm just saying that you should understand too," he said. "That… he and Dean…" He sighed. "I don't know, Gabe. I don't know what I'm saying, but it's making me uncomfortable and I'm sure it's making Cas uncomfortable too so I'm just going to stop."

They didn't say much else for the rest of the night.

…

The next morning, they got up to go check out the victim of what they thought could be a group of demons nearby, and likely powerful ones too if the out-of-the-blue drought-like conditions and reports of repeated, inexplicable electric issues were anything to go by.

"Sally Witman had no physical signs of injury, nor did she have anything medically wrong with her, and she dropped dead after black smoke was apparently seen leaving her mouth," Gabriel said in a professional voice from the back of the Impala. They would have to pretend to be reporters, as they usually did, because Balthazar and Gabriel both looked way too young to be anything like a cop, and Cas was honestly pushing it.

"Obvious possession," Balthazar said, looking back at him.

Cas turned onto Jacob Witman's, brother and old roommate of the late Sally Witman, street. They stopped in front of his house. It felt incredibly wrong to be pretending to be reporters and coming to talk about his sister's death only a month after it had happened, but he was the only one in town that had any real connection to her, and they suspected that he, too, might be possessed anyway.

Which was why they had holy water tucked away into their flannels.

When they pulled up in front of the house, it looked completely wrecked_._ The door was beaten down, chairs were broken all over the porch, and with the windows rolled down, Cas could hear noise coming from inside the house. He frowned and got out of the car quickly, his brothers following. They made sure they had their guns and rushed into the house, looking around.

There was blood all over the living room, and a man lying dead over to the side, stabbed and pushed out of the way of whoever was left fighting.

They pulled their guns out and held them out as they went further into the house cautiously, the sounds of fighting getting louder. In the kitchen, at the back of the house, there were two demons fighting a single blonde girl with a knife, and the blonde girl was _kicking their asses._ Every time she got the demons with her knife, the cut glowed orange and they hissed unlike any other time Cas had seen a demon cut with a simple knife before. She managed to plunge it into the chest of one of the demons. It screamed, flickering orange like the wounds, and died.

"Holy fucking shit," Gabriel said, and the three of them stepped back. This girl could _definitely_ handle it without their help.

The second demon died not long after, and they all stared in awe at the girl. "Little late, aren't you?" she said, raising an eyebrow at them.

"Who the hell are you?" Balthazar said.

She rolled her eyes at him. "Just the girl that saved your asses from having to deal with this hunt," she said. "Town's clear, kiddos." She left the room, and they all just kind of stood there for a second, shocked. By the time they went out to look for her, she was nowhere to be found.

They got back in the Impala but didn't leave that. "What… what?"

"Who _was_ that?" Gabriel said from the backseat.

"What kind of knife was that?" Balthazar said, and Cas thought that that was the better question to ask, honestly.

"We need to ask Bobby about her," Cas said dazedly.

"She was kinda hot," Gabriel said, and Cas looked at him in the mirror and rolled his eyes. "Shut up, jerk, she was too old for you."

"Bitch," he said, and Cas smiled slightly, feeling like they had made up at least a little. "And no way. She looked Balthazar's age."

"She looked older than me!" Cas said, rolling his eyes. "Which means too old for you."

"Okay, fine, maybe she's a _year_ older than you, at most," he said. "That's only five years older than me."

"Gabe, you're barely even legal!" he said, rolling his eyes as he started to pull away. He saw Balthazar smiling amusedly out of the corner of his eye. "You couldn't even legally drink if we didn't make fake IDs, man. Twenty-four is too old for you."

"Well, according to my totally not fake ID, I'm twenty-one, and I stand by that," he said. "Three years isn't bad."

"You're an ass."

"Nah."

"You both are literally the biggest asses I'll ever know, so would you shut the hell up?" Balthazar said, smiling at them. "Play some music, Cas. But not so loud I can't hear you. You're getting as bad as Gabriel."

"You sound like you're the oldest," Cas said, reaching over and turning the radio on, turning it down enough that they could still talk as they drove back to their motel for their stuff, because apparently that lady hunter had beaten them, and yeah, Cas wouldn't be able to get that off his head for a while.

"That's 'cause I'm the most mature by far," Balthazar said.

…

Before they got back to Bobby's, they found another case in Buffalo, where their mom's storage unit was. It involved a creepy rabbit's foot, a lot of bad luck, lost shoes, and one Bela Talbot. As hot and British as she was, Cas decided that he definitely wanted to distance himself from her for, like, as long as he possibly could. Bobby searched for the mysterious demon-killing knife girl while they dealt with Bela Talbot's mess with the rabbit foot.

And really. If she wasn't completely annoying as all hell and the bitchiest bitch he'd encountered in a while, he would've flirted _so hard._

She was hot. Like. Really, really.

Part of him wondered if he thought about how hot she was because he was trying to get over Dean, and he needed a nice, healthy one-night stand to help him cope, and another part of him told that part to shut the hell up _he was fine_, and a third part just looked at the first part funny because in what world does a one-night stand cure angst rather than create more.

And then, of course, the most prominent part was the fourth part, and it just kept chanting: _damn she was hot damn she was hot damn she was hot._

Their life was actually _angel-free_ for a while, which was both torture and a relief. He wanted to see Dean badly, wanted to kiss him and hug him and forgive him and just… just _be with _him, but the thing was, he couldn't forgive him. And he couldn't kiss him and hug him and be with him if he hadn't forgiven him. He was still hurt in so many ways that this man that he had trusted his life and his secrets and his brother's life with had knowingly let his brother die and let him condemn his own life because of it, all for some stupid fucking plan that a bunch of assholes thought up for their own sick pleasure, or whatever the hell the angel plan was meant for.

None of that stopped him from missing the angel desperately.

On the third day of the second week of angel-freeness, everything suddenly became more angel-filled when Samuel showed up at Bobby's, all stoical and confused and archangel-y. He apparently appeared first in Gabriel's room, because what alerted them to his presence was a loud shout from Gabriel: "_Holy motherfucking shit you scared the actual living piss out of me!_"

Balthazar, Cas, and Bobby looked up from the boring TV show they were watching, beers in their hands, as Gabriel led the archangel down the stairs and into the living room. He looked around almost curiously, before maybe deciding he really didn't care about this human establishment. He looked down at Gabriel like he was the most important thing in the world, and normally that would've been sweet or romantic, but honestly, it was just creepy with Samuel. Their was no romantic or sexual desire behind his eyes; only a fiery intensity that let them all know easily that hell would _freeze over _before Gabriel was killed again.

"Uh, I think this is Samuel," Gabriel said.

…

It was pretty fucking weird and scary when Samuel just showed up _directly_ in front of him, but what made everything worse was that he was in his boxers, getting ready to go to bed. It was dark, peaceful, and he could hear the quiet noises of the three men downstairs watching television or something. He needed a little nap from all the hunting they'd been doing that week, because after their tiny little break they took there where they mostly just stayed at Bobby's, going back out and driving here and there and back and forth for hours, their only reprieves being in the Impala or in shitty motels, was exhausting.

He loved hunting and all, but he could really get used to Bobby's lifestyle, hunting here, advising there, and telling everyone to shut the fuck up sometimes too.

But the point was, he just wanted to sleep. And then there was a pretty _massive_ man in front of him and blocking his path and he was pretty sure he nearly jumped all the way out of the window for how hard he leapt backward, flailing out for a weapon that wasn't there.

"It's all right," the man said quickly, while he was still trying to find something to kill him with, clumsily of course. "I am Samuel."

He looked at him for a second, and oddly enough, he kind of recognized him. So instead of continuing to try to find something to blow his actual brains out, he shouted, furious and still scared absolutely shitless, "_Holy motherfucking shit you scared the actual living piss out of me!_"

Samuel just stared at him for a second, before saying, "I don't understand what is holy about shit that… fucks its mother, and I don't understand how piss could be living."

"Damn it, you major fucking asshole," he said, catching his breath and moving to get pants and a shirt on before he led the guy downstairs. "I thought I was going to jump out of my fucking boxers."

"You did appear to be… struggling," Samuel said slowly, frowning at him slightly. "I didn't mean to scare you so badly."

"No, man, it's fine," he said, pulling a shirt over his head and sleep pants on. "Just… never do that again. Ever."

Samuel stared at him the whole way downstairs, and it was honestly pretty creepy too. Balthazar and Cas looked pretty amused, and Bobby just looked annoyed, probably because he didn't need this kind of shit this late at night, and he was probably also sick and tired of angels parading through his house all the time.

"Uh, I think this is Samuel," Gabriel said, glancing up at the unfairly massive angel.

Balthazar grinned at him. "Your first encounter with an angel," he said. "Dean scared the shit out of us first time we met him too."

"At least he didn't kidnap you," Cas said, and Gabriel was glad to see that he wasn't sulking even though his precious Dean's name was mentioned. He was actually talking about it. If he didn't know any better, he'd put a silver bullet through Cas, because he _didn't _just talk about things. "He took me to a barn to show off his wings 'cause I thought he was a demon."

"I just don't get why all these damn angels think my house is the go-to place," Bobby said, shaking his head. "Why don't they get obsessed with the Harvelles? The roadhouse has more beer than I do."

He cocked his head slightly. "I am not here for alcohol, Robert."

"_Bobby_," he said, rolling his eyes.

"What are you here for?" Gabriel asked.

He looked down at him again, the same intensely focused look that kind of scared him. "I wanted to talk to you. I assume Castiel has spoken to you about what happened last time I saw him, and I want to avoid you screaming like you did in case I need to pop up in a serious situation."

"Well, that makes a lot of sense, actually," he said. "Why protect me, though?"

He shrugged slightly. "Have you heard about the bond that Castiel and my brother shared?" he said. "How he was technically Castiel's guardian angel and all of that."

"Uh, kind of. They haven't really filled me in all the way," he said.

"Sorry," Balthazar said, but Cas said nothing.

"Oh. Well, we were supposed to have that. I was supposed to be your guardian angel. And it is rare for a guardian angel to be assigned at all, and for an archangel to volunteer is rarer. But I was intrigued in you, for reasons I probably shouldn't disclose," he said. He glanced at Castiel, and Gabriel was so freaking confused because he knew _nothing_ about the stupid angelic plan they referred to, except for the bits and pieces he picked up on or the vague, unhelpful details they told him about when he asked. It really made him angry, but he never said anything about it. "Anyway, we were never bonded. The other angels decided it was for the best that you didn't receive a guardian. I'm still interested in you, for the same reasons I was before. I would still like to protect you."

"You think I deserve it?" he asked, frowning at him, because why would Samuel be doing this if he didn't think Gabriel deserved it?

"Of course you do," Cas said, typically butting in at that moment.

"What Castiel said," Samuel said, nodding. "Also, I get very bored, and I don't think I'm going to be able to avoid everything to do with the angel plan, so I decided to instead take a side."

"And you took our side?" Balthazar said, raising an eyebrow.

"Well… hmm. I can't explain," he said. "But… I am protecting Gabriel, and I'd like to try to protect the three of you, too, especially if you're trying to distance yourself from Dean, Castiel. Which is wise. He needs distance, before he falls completely."

Castiel nodded tightly. "I'm not doing it for that reason though."

He shrugged. "Well, keep away from him all the same."

"Pretty pissed with Adam too," he muttered, looking away from them.

Gabriel looked over at Balthazar to see if this was just Cas being unreasonable again or not. Balthazar talked about Adam a lot when they talked together, so he figured, if anyone knew, it was definitely going to be him. He seemed pretty indifferent to it, though, so maybe he was angry or maybe he wasn't.

Gabriel was getting really fed up with not knowing things.

"Well, then, I'm going to go upstairs," he said, wanting to just get away from them all and go to bed or something.

They all called out their goodnights to him. Samuel flew away, or so it seemed, but when he went back upstairs, there he was, sitting on Gabriel's bed. He jumped and shook his head. "Fuck, Samuel, please don't just pop in and out, okay?"

He frowned at him slightly but nodded. "I just wanted to talk alone," he told him.

Gabriel raised an eyebrow at him. "All right…"

He definitely looked older than Gabriel. Maybe Cas's age, with shaggy hair and boyish bangs. His hazel eyes seemed almost devoid of humanity upon first glance, but now that they were both making eye contact, talking, Gabriel could see that it was just hidden. He was curious about where Samuel had been hiding out for all those years suddenly.

"I just want you to know that… a lot of stuff is gonna happen," he said, voice carefully calculated, slow, like Gabriel was an idiot or something, but he let it slide, wondering what Samuel could possibly have to get all mushy on him with. "I can't stop it, either. Not yet. Or it will just happen… worse. Okay? Dean should've had this conversation with Cas." He sighed. "But he is an idiot."

"What's the point of this?" Gabriel said.

"The point is… I don't really know, Gabriel. I'm not very good at this. I just don't want you to hate me like Castiel hates Dean if something bad that you think I could've predicted happens," he said. "Trust me, I'm going to look for a way to keep this all at bay, or maybe to end it entirely, but I'm not the most powerful archangel, and if I can't effectively stop it or keep it from happening to you and your brothers specifically, then I just have to let it run its course for a while. I know this is confusing. I think I am confusing myself."

Gabriel found himself smiling slightly at him, and he understood the appeal of angels suddenly. They were dorky and funny and completely, ridiculously clueless, especially this one sitting in front of him on the bed that he wanted nothing more than to just curl up and go to sleep on—preferably with his room angel-less, though.

"Okay, I think," he said. "Look, I honestly do want to talk to you, I think. You're interesting. But right now I'm really tired, and you're sitting on my bed. So if you could just… leave? Come back tomorrow or something."

Samuel cocked his head slightly, before nodding. "Okay. I'll come back sometime." He disappeared before he even stood up, and Gabriel shook his head.

He got down to his boxers again before crawling in the beds, sleeping dreamlessly.


	17. Chapter 17

**I know this took longer than usual but I just couldn't get it to come out. I think I had a lot of writer's block. But here it is. And yeah this one's good for Sabriel shippers but really bad for Destiel shippers. But Destiel is kind of the main ship so I thought I'd give Sabriel the spotlight for once.**

**Yeah and it's in all Gabriel's POV. With literally like two seconds of Cas and zero Dean unless you count the handful of mentions.**

**But tons of Gabriel and Balthazar brotherliness which is always good because Balthazar doesn't get the love very much and so none of you really see all the pain he's going through even though I know it's happening, so I thought I'd kind of show it for once.**

* * *

_He got down to his boxers again before crawling in the bed, sleeping dreamlessly._

…

The next morning, Samuel woke Gabriel up when he appeared in the room without warning, looming ominously over the bed, casting an extremely tall shadow over him and blocking the sunlight that had been falling on his face before. He jumped away when he heard the flutter of Samuel's wings and glared at him, closing his eyes tightly, not wanting to be awake at all but having no choice with the annoying, large archangel standing over his bed and peering at him curiously, like it was weird that he was so scared or that he was asleep or that he was shirtless or _something._

"What the hell are you doing, Samuel?" Gabriel said.

He shrugged slightly and looked around the room. "I wanted to come check on you," he said.

"You literally were just here last night," he said. Figuring he wasn't going to be able to get back to sleep anytime soon, he stood up to get clothes on. "Turn around, I'm changing my underwear."

He frowned at him slightly. "Why do I have to turn around?"

"Because my dick will be hanging out and that's not something I'm comfortable with you seeing," he said, pulling underwear out of the dresser he used. He loved staying at Bobby's. It was like having a home. It _was_ having a home. It was perfect. "God, just turn around, Sam."

He frowned even more, the look in his eyes becoming more intense as he reluctantly turned away from him. "Please do not use my father's name like that."

He changed into different underwear and put other clothes on as well. "Sorry. You can turn around now."

Sam—Gabriel liked Sam a lot more than Samuel, because even though the guy was extremely uptight, Samuel sounded too snotty for the guy—Sam turned around. "I apologize for coming now, if it's an inconvenient time."

"Kind of is, but it's too late," he said, shrugging and going to leave his room, assuming that Sam would follow behind him. "You're already here."

"I could still leave—"

"It's fine."

Sam was quiet as they walked downstairs and to the kitchen, where Gabriel made himself a bowl of cereal. Bobby was up and also eating in the kitchen. He waved at Gabriel and looked up at Samuel. He didn't say anything until he was done eating, and neither did Gabriel or Sam. They sat in a half-uncomfortable half-indifferent silence until Bobby put his dishes up and said, "I've got a case for you boys if you wanna go. It's near the roadhouse. Figured you guys should go talk to Ellen, Jo, and Ash a bit. But I can send them if you don't want it."

Gabriel looked up at him and shook his head. "I want it. What is it?"

"I'll tell ya when you're all up," he said. He nodded toward the angel. "You just talk to him, I guess."

He nodded as Bobby left the room, and then looked up at Sam as he shoveled another spoonful of the bland cereal into his mouth, swallowing it down. It was starting to get soggy, but he was tired and hungry and it didn't really faze him.

Sam towered over him. It didn't help that Gabriel was rather short as it was. Sam's vessel was at least 6'4. Gabriel felt how tall he was as he moved past him to put his cereal away. The angel's eyes were glued to him the whole way there and back to the table again, where he sat and looked up at him, ready to talk about whatever he intended to talk about with him.

"I could go on the case with you," Sam suggested. "It would make things easier."

"Cas wouldn't like that," he said, sighing slightly. He would like for him to accompany them, because he wanted to know more about him and because it would make things easier and quicker, leaving more time for them to hang out with Ellen, Jo, and Ash at the roadhouse. Gabriel was too young to remember the last time he'd seen them, but they seemed nice, despite the fact that there was some sort of tension between the Novak family and the Harvelle family.

"Don't bring him, then," he said simply, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. That was a desirable option, but they couldn't. He shook his head, and Sam sighed slightly. "Okay, well, I was just offering. I get bored too."

He frowned slightly at him and looked down at the table for a second. This guy was so _weird_, and that was the best word he could think of to describe him. He was mysterious and indifferent and oblivious and oddly interesting. He wanted to sit down with him and just _talk_ for hours, wanted to learn about every second of the millions of years he'd surely lived through. He wanted to know all of his favorite memories, wanted to know what he'd been doing that had disconnected him from humans and his family recently. He wanted to learn about this crazy being in front of him, wanted to be trusted and to trust.

It was kind of an empty desire to be liked by him, empty in a way because there was something missing about it. He wanted to know what it was so he could get it at once, wanted to fill that hole that he had never known was there before.

"You feel it too," Sam said suddenly, a small smile coming to his face. "We were almost bonded before. What you're feeling is your soul yearning for connection with my grace. I believe it will fade."

"Good," he said, frowning at him. He didn't like this _need_ to be around him.

"I think that's why I wanted to come back so badly," he said.

"Because of the not-bond?" he asked him.

He nodded.

"Well, I want it to go away quickly," he said. "I don't want to be friends with you only because there's something needy in me begging to be around you."

"It is unpleasant," he said, shrugging nonchalantly, completely unattached to that unpleasant feeling he was apparently feeling. Angels were kind of weird.

They were both awkwardly silent for a second, and Gabriel very much wanted for Samuel to leave, although he knew his soul, or whatever, would protest the moment he was gone.

Finally Balthazar came downstairs and broke the awkwardness. He raised an eyebrow at the sight of Sam there, and Gabriel shrugged slightly. He did as well and pulled out cereal, plopping down at the table next to Gabriel and eating. "Bobby said there's a case," he said, looking over at him. "Are we going?"

"I want to," he said, nodding. "Why wouldn't we?"

He shrugged. "Dunno. Cas is talking about going off on cases on his own," he said. He sounded irritated, and Gabriel didn't blame him. Cas sulked more and more and got increasingly more ridiculous with each passing second. He had been doing so… Well, he had been a lot less stupid and annoying when Dean was there with him. Especially with only under a year of time to figure out how to save him, Gabriel was pretty sure that he needed to just suck it up and talk to Dean. From what Sam had said, it seemed like Dean just made a mistake because he didn't know what else to do.

"Why don't we just go, then?" Gabriel said finally. "If Castiel wants to be an ass and go on a case on his own, so be it. We'll go on this one, and then we'll really get down to looking for a way to save him."

Balthazar looked over at him. He swallowed his mouthful of cereal and then said, "Really?"

"Yeah. Hunting with just you sounds good anyway," he said. "I love Cas, and I'm really worried and scared for him, but I need a break from him."

"Me, too," he said, smiling slightly. He nodded toward Sam, who was still standing there, stiffly but that wasn't unusual for him. "What about him?"

"He can come, too," Gabe suggested, looking up at him and smiling as well.

Sam frowned at him slightly but he nodded, and Gabriel took that as _Yeah, I'll go._

…

They were told what the case was about and where it was exactly, and then they said goodbye to Castiel and Bobby and hopped in a car. Sam sat in the backseat. Gabriel highly doubted that he would stay there the whole time when he could just fly there ahead of them and scope things out. Gabriel wanted to relax and talk to—or rather, kind of meet—Jo and Ellen before they went off to start the case, though.

"They're so nice," Balthazar told him as Gabriel kicked his feet up on the dashboard of the car that Bobby had let them borrow. They had asked for the Impala, but Cas just snapped, _Like hell I'm gonna let you go off on a case without me and take my Baby._ "Seriously, though, they just let us stay there for a while, with Dean too. And Ellen's very motherly and Jo's very sisterly."

"But there's tension there?" Gabriel asked, looking over at his brother, who was mostly focusing with his eyes on the road.

Balthazar nodded. "Only because of our mom. They're probably over it by now, and if they're not, we need to talk to them about it anyway," he said. "Our mom got Jo's dad killed on a hunt."

He nodded slightly. He felt bad about that, but there was really nothing he could do about the fact that their mom was a serious fuckup when it came to keeping promises or anything. After all, she promised to come visit them, and now she was either dead because of her stupidity or ignoring them entirely.

It was nice to have time to talk to Balthazar about whatever they wanted. Most of the time when they were speaking, it was because they needed to talk about Cas's soul, or he was being an ass and it needed addressed. To have a plan to run on about his soul and to have him gone and out of their hair for a bit was nice.

As much as he wanted to keep the generally nice atmosphere in the car, with the music playing softly, humming along to it idly while Sam asked questions from the back like, "Why do you insist on playing music? What does humming achieve? I prefer silence. You're not good at humming." When Gabriel flipped him off or made a comment to confuse him, Sam just frowned at him and shook his head.

Finally he said, "I'll meet you there," and disappeared, so it was quieter for about five minutes until Gabriel looked over at his brother again.

"So… what was Jessica like?" he asked quietly.

Judging by the way Balthazar automatically tensed up, he hadn't talked to Cas much about it yet, and Cas hadn't insisted for him to. Gabriel thought that that was a big mistake. If he was ever going to move on from it, he had to talk about it, and then he had to accept it, and then he had to find another girl or something. Maybe the last part wasn't necessary, but it was inevitable.

"I don't… Gabe, can we not?" he asked.

"You haven't moved on," he said, drawing his feet down from the dashboard and getting serious. "And I want to help."

He shook his head. "I'll deal with it by myself. It's been a year and I'm fine."

"No, it's been a year and you haven't been given the real opportunity to grieve because Castiel had stuff of his own to work out," he said. "And I'm not saying that that makes Cas a shitty brother because we both know he's probably the best brother out of the three of us. It isn't his fault and if he didn't have whatever the bond was on his back plus Dean and the stress of finding me, he probably would've taken more care to making sure you're okay."

"I don't blame Cas," Balthazar said stonily.

"I'm talking to myself as much as I'm talking to you," Gabriel replied.

"I'm talking to myself as much as I'm talking to you," Gabriel replied. "But it's good that you don't. I just think you need to talk about it."

"Look, Gabe, I'm fine," he said. "Honestly. I don't want to talk about it, and I don't want to go through with whatever it is that you think will help 'get me over it' or whatever. Okay? I'm fine."

"But you haven't looked at a girl like that since Jessica, have you?" he asked.

He rolled his eyes. "I'm not like you and Cas. I don't pick up the first girl I see."

"Well, you see, that's where you're wrong. I'm too young for most girls we meet, and Cas also picks up dudes," he said, grinning at him slightly.

"Yeah, well, whatever, Gabriel," he said, rolling his eyes at him more.

He reached out to turn the music up louder and Gabriel leaned forward and shut it off before he could. He caught a glare form his brother but disregarded it, instead trying to figure out where he wanted to go with this conversation about Jessica now that it was happening.

"Gabe, can we not do this?" he said before he had the time to start some sort of plan. "I don't want to talk about it and I don't think I have to. So I won't. And that's just how it's going to work out, okay?"

He shook his head. "No. Just because I'm the youngest doesn't mean you can just brush it off. I'm going to fix this, and we're going to start by having you telling me what Jessica was like. Just tell me about her."

He was silent for a second, and Gabriel thought he would just protest more, but finally he sighed and said, "You're ridiculous," in a way that let Gabriel know that he was definitely giving up. He held in his smile and waited for Balthazar to continue. It took a second, and he was patient throughout that second while Balthazar's eyes stayed glued to the road in frustration. He opened his mouth a couple times but didn't say anything.

When he finally did speak, he started it with: "Cas didn't talk to me much about any of it, but I knew that he understood how much she meant to me when he told me that Dean could be his Jess. It was kind of like a punch in the face, but I knew that he meant it. And now that Dean's betrayed him... I just feel like I understand, because if Jess had done that to me..."

Gabriel didn't say anything, just nodded understandingly despite the fact that he was totally clueless about anything and everything to do with Stanford, his time at Cold Oak, Jessica, Dean, and anything else that he felt he should know about but didn't. The only thing he knew more about than anyone else was Sam, and he thought that maybe Cas might even know more because Dean might have told him about him before. He couldn't get over how annoying that was.

"She was beautiful, and she was smart, and she loved me," he said, with the most heartbreaking of little, helpless shrugs. "We fit together well. I… I was happy, there at Stanford, even if I did miss you and Cas. And I wanted to call you, but I couldn't come back to this life, not when I had her. She was everything to me."

Gabriel literally couldn't even start to imagine what that would be like. He didn't know how it would feel to live a regular, domestic life. He didn't know how it would feel to be smart enough to get into Stanford for medicine or whatever Balthazar had been studying. He didn't know what it was like to be in love with someone. He didn't know any of what he was feeling. At least Cas knew the in love part, with Dean and all.

"Would you have married her?" Gabriel asked quietly, not caring that he sounded really young and almost scared, scared of the notion that there was a way out, scared of the idea of his big brother losing so much.

"Yeah, I was going to. I really was," he said. He frowned in a way that told Gabriel he was trying to hold back tears. "I know you're going to say it wasn't, but it was my fault. If I had told her, if I had protected her…" He swallowed and shook his head. "I don't understand what I have to do with this angel plan, but damn it all to fucking hell because I'm not participating. I know Jess's death had to do with the plan, and anything that contributed to that shit is something I will not stand with. It's what killed you too, and it's what's going to kill Castiel if we don't figure a way to fix this."

Gabriel nodded. "Sam isn't for the angel plan."

"Good for him, but he'll still go through with it," he said. He sighed slightly. "Can we please talk about something else now?"

Gabriel nodded. He didn't want to press it any further.

…

When they made it to the roadhouse, Balthazar told him to pray to Sam so he would know they were there. It seemed ridiculous until he did and Sam showed up as soon as he was done praying. He didn't say anything, just followed the two Novaks into the roadhouse.

The women he assumed to be Ellen and Jo were behind the bar. There were hunters all around the bar, drinking and talking and eating.

Balthazar went over to the bar and Ellen smiled at him while Jo got a drink for a hunter. "Hey, Balthazar," she said. "And you're Gabriel. I didn't get a proper look at you the night Hell opened up." It was then that he remembered that she'd been there. That had been a hectic night and only the vague details were definitely clear to hi. "You look just like your brothers."

Gabriel didn't really believe that, because he was shorter and had a weirder nose and was the only one without blue eyes—he generally just didn't think he looked much like his brothers. He had seen pictures of their father, and he thought he looked most like him, whereas his brothers more resembled their mother. While Castiel had practically the same hair as their dad, he resembled their mother greatly if you looked at him long enough and he had her eyes. Balthazar had her hair, her eyes, her nose.

"Who's that?" Ellen asked, nodding back toward Sam. Gabriel looked at him. He was standing their stiffly, looking extremely uncomfortable.

"Another angel," Balthazar said. "Samuel."

Ellen nodded, motioning for them to sit at the bar as she scurried off to help another hunter. Jo finally came over to them and smiled at them, apparently over the fact that their mother got her dad killed by now, which Gabriel was glad for because he didn't want to deal with that grudge.

"Hey," she said. "Do you three want anything?"

Balthazar and Gabriel shook their heads, so Jo looked expectantly at Sam. He just frowned and said, "I don't know what I would want."

"Sorry," Gabriel said about him. "He's an angel. So he's kind of clueless and rude."

"Yeah, we've dealt with Cas's angel," she said. "So you're Gabriel."

"Yep, and you're Jo," he replied, smiling at her.

She nodded. "I am. Are you here about the hunt?"

"Yeah, we are," Balthazar said, nodding. "Are you helping with it?"

"I was going to do it on my own if you guys didn't come," she said. "Or with my mom, I guess. I don't think she'd approve of me doing it alone. But yeah, I'm definitely helping."

"Okay," he said.

"Where is Cas?" she asked, frowning slightly like she expected for him to come back. "And where's the angel he drags along?"

"Uh, well, yeah," Balthazar said. He sighed slightly, like he was trying to think of a short way to tell her the whole story. There definitely wasn't a short way. "It's kind of a long story."

"Okay," she said simply, nodding and looking over as Ellen called her name. "Tell me after we close up." She went back to her mother's side.

Gabriel looked over at Balthazar. "Wasn't there a guy too?" he asked. "Ash?"

"Yeah, he's probably around here somewhere," he said, shrugging and looking around, maybe for Ash. "Want to go get our stuff and take it up to our rooms?"

"Sure," he said. He stood and went out to the car as Balthazar went to the women, presumably to tell them what they were doing.

Sam followed him out there and he had him carry it all up to the rooms, since he could do it. Balthazar jumped a little bit when Sam flew them up there, not expecting for them to do that. Gabriel grinned at him and he rolled his eyes as he led them to the rooms they were using.

They went past a room with a sign saying _Dr. Badass is in_, and Gabriel assumed that that was Ash's. All he knew about him was that he was extremely smart and had a mullet, which was basically about the only level of description he got about anything, not just about this Ash guy. Maybe he shouldn't have been so bitter about his lack of knowledge. They didn't know what he did or didn't know, and he wasn't really bringing it up. But he was just annoyed that he was kidnapped so long and he felt guilty because of everything it caused—especially Cas selling his soul. He tried to not think about it, but that ate away at him.

Balthazar and Gabriel were rooming separately. They put their stuff in the extra rooms of the roadhouse and then went back downstairs to talk to Ellen and Jo again. All the seats at the bar were taken, so they got a table, and talked idly about the case. There was a disappearance a few towns over, and the body was found up in a tree, mauled like an animal had gotten to it. This happened three times before, all within a week, twenty-some years before.

"What does it sound like to you?" Gabriel asked Samuel, looking up at him.

"Demons," he said, shrugging slightly, "or gods. Actually, there are a few things it could be. I'll have to go look at the place with you."

He nodded. "Okay," he said.

…

They talked with Ellen, Jo, and Ash once all the others left. The case wasn't even the main topic of conversation; they spent an extensive amount of time just simply chatting, talking about their worries over Castiel, explaining Castiel's situation. In Sam and Gabriel's case, they were just getting to know the residents of the roadhouse, so they were all learning about each other. Ellen said she remembered Gabriel, but that was when he was too young to have developed a personality yet.

"You've grown up well, just like your brothers," she said, smiling at him. She was so maternal that it left an ache inside him, a throbbing sensation that amplified the hurt over their own mother abandoning them, or dying, or whatever happened to her. Bobby was like the paternal figure they'd never had, and Ellen was the maternal figure that they needed, even if they had had one before.

Jo was completely sisterly, like Balthazar said. She was pretty and it was obvious that she was badass, without even seeing her in action, but he just didn't really think of her as a potential girlfriend or anything. She was older than him, so it wasn't a protective thing. Maybe it was the fact that he felt like there was some sort of mother-son relationship between Ellen and the Novak brothers, and that was why they all labeled her as sister.

Well, anyway, she was one seriously kickass older sister.

She was just _funny_, and she took no one's shit, and she talked about her recent hunts and she seemed like a really good hunter, especially for just recently starting out and getting real about it. She was just cool. Jo was really cool.

Ash was, like Balthazar stressed, extremely smart, but also laidback and generally cool too. He and Sam talked about some complicated shit that pertained to the case that Gabriel was sure he was too stupid to ever comprehend.

Sam actually worked really well with them. As weird and distanced and clueless as he could be, he seemed to find a way to melt that all away and become a _lot _more humane than he previously seemed. Gabriel wondered if it had anything to do with whatever he did while he was pretending to be dead, and again he wondered what that was.

In any case, he didn't seem like an angel at all, but rather just a slightly uptight human. He joked with them, and talked about the case, and related and just—wow, okay, when he was relaxed and leaned back and betting with Jo about how much it would take to get him drunk, he was kind of cuter than before.

Which was totally ridiculous.

He did try to get drunk, tossing shot after shot and glass after glass back, until finally he looked up at him, his voice more relaxed than he'd ever heard it before, and said, "Well, damn."

They were all on their way to drunkenness, so that was basically the most hilarious thing all night, and they all laughed for five minutes straight until it was that kind of breathless, doubled-over laughter that tugged at your stomach and brought tears to your eyes and persisted until you literally couldn't laugh anymore for a few minutes.

Of course, Sam didn't get what was so funny, so after they laughed and he downed a few more drinks, he said, "What?" and that set Gabriel off again, even if no one else found it funny, because the fuckhead was too cute and stupid.

Sam never did get drunk, so he probably was the one that decided to end their little party and herd them all upstairs, but all Gabriel remembered from after the drinking stopped was a large, warm hand on the small of his back, and then suddenly it was around his waist because he was stumbling, and finally he barked out a laugh and for some reason that made the owner of the hand pick him up bridal style. He looked up at the face, the big goofy face with those stupid shaggy bangs that made him look younger and that one mole right there and he started to drift off lazily. The next thing he knew, he was in bed, and there was someone sitting there, waiting for him to fall asleep.

…

When he woke up, Sam wasn't there, because though he was hung over, but he distinctly remembered the goofy face and shaggy bangs and matched the description to Sam, so he knew it'd been him that carried him up.

However, despite the fact that Sam wasn't there, someone else was.

He nearly fell out of bed before he saw who it was, and when he did, he fought the urge to yell "Shit!" and couldn't form the words that would ask why the nameless girl with the demon-killing knife was in his room and sitting on his bed and just fucking staring at him like a piece of meat she wanted to sink her teeth into.

Eventually his tongue cooperated, and he managed to get out: "Who the hell are you?" which was the right question but delivered all clueless rather than all demanding, and it took away from the effect he wanted for it to have.

"I'm Ruby," she said, and he was glad that she actually gave a name, because he hadn't expected for her to. "I'm, uh. Well. Okay, don't freak out, because I've kind of got the room warded so no one's going to hear you anyway, but…" Before he could get panicked or anything, her eyes went black, and yeah. Now he was. He was freaked out.

"Shit! What the hell! Get the fuck out!" and it all sounded too high-pitched for him and, again, took away from the effect. He sounded like he was having more of a tantrum than trying to get a fucking demon to get out of his room.

She sighed. "I knew you'd freak out."

"Fuck, obviously!"

"Calm down, please, Gabriel. Yeah, I know who you are," she said. She let out a breath. "I want to help. Yes, you heard me. I want to help. I like your cause. Your whole saving Cas and fucking the angels over—hell yeah, I like that."

"How in the hell do you expect me to believe you?" he snapped incredulously, wishing he had one of her knives to sink into him.

"Yeah, see, that's the hard part." She bit her lip slightly, contemplating.

Before he had time to decide that it was a horrible plan, which it was, he started chanting, "_Exorcizamus te, omnis immundu—_" That pissed the bitch off, because she reached her hand out and suddenly he was slammed against the wall, eyes wide.

"Shut the fuck up," she snarled angrily, before slowly letting him go. He breathed again, and didn't continue the exorcism. She sighed and straightened her shirt. "I didn't want to do that. Don't send me back there, okay? Just fucking don't. Look. Okay. I just want to help, you've got to believe me. I can't prove it now, but I will. And I can make you more bullets for the Colt."

He stared at her disbelievingly. "Get rid of the wards and get the fuck out of here until you can prove it, you bitch," he snapped, and she rolled her eyes but waved a hand. The wards must've apparently disappeared. He looked around the room, and when he turned back to look at her again, she was gone.

What the _actual_ fuck.

* * *

**I have everything planned out until the end of part two when Cas's soul-selling deal is up, so I can tell you now that unless I think of something I didn't already foresee, the next chapter will be very Gabriel-centered too, and will feature little Dean and Cas, if any. But it might have Adam, and if I have time at the end for the Adam thing I want to do, Dean will definitely be there for that.**


	18. Chapter 18

**This chapter is shorter and later than usual because I've been writing another fic that I really love (not that I don't love this one) and I've been really attached to it lately. It's another destiel one, and I'm not posting it until it's entirely done and edited. I know it's title already, but I'm just going to call it Phillip for now. **

* * *

_What the __actual __fuck._

_…_

Castiel really believed he wasn't any more pissed than he thought he had any right to be. They left him alone while he was dealing with all this bullshit—for the goddamn angel. They went off to go have a great time on a road trip with their angel, and talk to Ellen, Jo, and Ash, and probably hunt with Jo and get a change of scenery and—yeah, well, he was pissed.

He wasn't staying at Bobby's for another second, because that was one part of it that he felt was slightly less justified than the rest of it. He was allowed to get a change of scenery too. He had a car. He was a big boy. He could drive his damn ass around and get a case of his own, although it would not be nearly as fun as if he had brothers at his side or an angel there.

For a brief moment, he actually considered praying to Dean. That made him really angry, and then he just basically wanted to crawl away and just sit in whatever corner he found and be there forever, like an asshole little middle school kid whose crush just rejected them.

Fuck that. No. Dean was not his stupid crush. He was not going to be a baby about this shit. He was going to stand up, get the fuck out there, and do something on his own. He was not going to run to Stanford and retrieve a backup brother, was not going to ruin someone else's life, was not going to make the rest of his own life significantly more miserable.

And that kind of made him mad all over again, because damn it, he had a year. Less than a year—he had around eleven months left of life, and then his throat was gonna get sliced out and he was going to get his ass sat down in the middle of hell for the rest of eternity. He kind of felt sick to his stomach at that thought and he really wanted a brother to talk to. He knew that even if one was there, he wouldn't talk to them. If he had any intentions on talking about it, he would've gone downstairs that instant and had a moment with Bobby.

Instead he threw his things into his bag, grabbed the Impala keys, and threw on his dad's leather jacket. The amulet his brothers gave him bumped against his chest as he went down the stairs, and he realized that he forgot his watch and other things upstairs. Irritated, he let out a huff of breath and got it before returning to downstairs and calling for Bobby.

He was in the living room, poring over some book. Cas caught a glimpse of the title, and he was sure it had something to do with… oh, God. Soul-selling. Why wouldn't they just accept the fact that there was no saving him? If there was a way, he would be all fucking for it. He was terrified. He didn't want to go to hell. But he was realistic, and they were just hopeful.

Bobby quickly tried to cover up the title, and Cas appreciated the effort. As much as it annoyed him, he knew they just wanted to keep him alive. He would be doing the same thing if it were Balthazar or Gabriel that sold their soul.

"I'm going on a hunt," he said. "I don't know where."

"Alone?" he said, frowning at him slightly. "Why don't you wait until your brothers are back?"

"I'm fine alone," he said tightly.

"I know, boy, but they ought to be back in a few days," he said, with a slight shrug, eyes falling back down to the book. "Do what you want, I guess."

He nodded. "I won't go on anything big, I promise."

"You're not calling Dean either?" Bobby asked, and he shouldn't have, because now Cas was filled with that stupid anger and frustration and sadness and betrayal and—ugh. He just. He wanted to call Dean badly. But he would not.

"No," he said, and he snapped it because he knew that Bobby would understand he wasn't snapping at him. He was snapping because of Dean. Because of circumstances. Because of his stupid self starting to fall in fucking love with an asshole angel that had been lying to him about everything all along, and it would take a fucking great excuse to get him to start to begin the forgiveness process between the two of them.

It was better this way. He was angry with Dean, but he didn't want him to fall.

Better.

He almost had to remind himself who it was better for. Everyone. It was better for everyone.

God. He hated everything.

…

The case went great. It was, in fact, demons, so Sam smote them—and if smiting wasn't the most badass thing that Gabriel would ever see in his lifetime, he didn't know what would be. They went back to the roadhouse and celebrated their little victory. Jo was really fun to go on a case with. The four of them worked well together in a team.

When the night was over, and they were all full from a big dinner, a few drinks, a lot of laughter, and then more serious talk about plans about the days ahead for searching for things for Cas, they all went up to bed, which mean that Sam left. Gabriel no longer felt a tug when he was gone, but he did ask if he'd be back the next day, because when Sam loosened up, he was really, really cool. All it took was a little laughter, a few drinks, and, weirdly, something sweet. His eyes brightened as soon as Ellen brought out the pie and cheesecake.

He was informed by Balthazar that they were lucky they had Ash. He would be invaluable. Then they parted ways, and Gabriel laid down, shut his eyes, and started to drift off.

The next thing he knew, there was a hand over his face, and he was no longer at the roadhouse anymore.

The shout came too late. By the time he screamed for his brother, he was in a restaurant. It was dark outside the window he was sitting at, but people were still bustling around, still serving. Maybe he was in a different time zone. That really wasn't the biggest issue.

The blonde demon—he searched for her name in his mind for a second before remembering Ruby—was sitting in front of him, French fries in a little basket in front of her, throwing them in her mouth nonchalantly. She smiled at him, kind of mockingly, and offered him a French fry. He sat there, completely stunned, not knowing what the hell to do. He was unarmed and—fuck, he was still in his boxers.

"What the hell? Get me out of here," he snapped, keeping his voice slightly low, not wanting to draw attention to them.

She shook her head, finishing off the fries. "Nope. I've got a case for us to go on. Then we can work on the Colt, and be back in time to get to your little group before they really start freaking out. And then we can all work on fixing Cas. Because yes, I can help. I'm aware you have an archangel on your side too, but face it, Gabey. He may be against the plan, but there's no way he's going to want to piss off his frankly more powerful brothers."

"How do you know how to get Cas out of his better than Samuel?" Gabriel said, frowning at her.

"I'm a demon. I know these things," she said. She pushed the empty basket that held fries away from her and raised an eyebrow. "So what do you say? You in? You can have a container of holy water on you the whole time if you're scared."

"A container of holy water," he repeated, not believing that any of this was actually going on. "You're kidding me."

"Nope," she said. "You don't actually think I'm going to hand over my knife, do you?"

"Yeah, about that knife," he said, frowning even more at her. "How does it work?"

"Why would I tell you that?" she said. She stood up. "You coming? 'Cause I'm not giving you a ride if you're not."

He looked at her for a long second before grudgingly standing up. "Holy water and an exorcism," he said. He saw her rolling her eyes out of the corner of his eye, but he also saw her nodding as she gave in, so he went out of the restaurant, the demon—the fucking _demon_—following behind him. Once outside, she put a hand on his shoulder and flew, teleported, whatever, them away.

…

When Castiel was done with the case, he started to head back to his motel to search for another before he headed back out. He had no intentions of returning to Bobby's or making his way to the roadhouse anytime soon. He didn't want to distance himself from them, but he needed a little air to think. He knew Balthazar and Gabriel were safe in each other's and Ellen, Ash, and Jo's hands, so he wasn't worried about them. And of course Bobby didn't need any worrying about, ever, so all he had to be guilty about leaving them behind for was the fact that in less than a year, there would be no choice but to be separated from them—forever.

He wanted out of the deal badly. He wanted company behind him more than that, even. He just wanted to not being alone. If there was one thing he hated more than anything else, besides the monsters he hunted on a daily basis, it was hunting alone, or being alone at all. When his mom left him, it would like someone had shoved a knife into his chest and just twisted, twisted, twisted. The list of names of the people who had left him behind or betrayed him grew longer every day, and that hole in his hear that that knife left was growing with it.

He was so tempted to call Dean at one point that he sat down and started to pray to _Adam_. Adam of all people, just because he needed someone to talk to about Dean who would understand the betrayal he felt, someone Dean had done wrong to for as well. But he remembered that Adam was in a bit of trouble for his disappearing act, and that was honestly all that stopped him from praying.

Okay, well, that was a lie. Not even that stopped him. It was the sound of his phone ringing and seeing Balthazar's name on the other end that made him stop himself.

He picked up and expected to hear him talk about the case, ask for advice, ask for him to come down with them, something. Instead Balthazar's words were frantic as burst out, "Gabriel's missing."

Immediately all thoughts of Dean and Adam were gone from his mind. "Missing?" he said worriedly, sitting up from his slumped position on the bed, ready to pounce toward his clothes and stuff them into his bag. "How? When was the last you saw him?"

"Last night!" he said. "We haven't even gone on the case yet. He was just up in his room, and now it's noon and he's missing. Not in his room. Not anywhere. All his stuff, even his phone and crap, are gone."

"Okay, do you want me to come?" he said. He didn't really know why he asked. He would come anyway. He was already up and packing his back, slinging it over his shoulder and grabbing his keys.

"Of course," Balthazar said. "Please hurry. Sam's looking. I… Cas, we should call Dean."

Castiel stopped at the door of the Impala, just about to unlock it. He knew this was true, and it was a perfect excuse to pray to him like he was wanting to do, but he couldn't bring himself to do it now that he had to. He was being stupid though. Stupid and idiotic and just a fucking ass. He was so frustrated with himself and with everything else.

"Yeah, I know, I will," he said before he could do something even stupider and more idiotic and asshole-ish like ask Balthazar to do it for him. "I'll pray to Dean, you pray to Adam."

"Okay," he said. "Please hurry, Cas."

He hung up before Castiel had time to say anything else. He put his phone down and started to drive, already starting some informal bullshit prayer to Dean. _Hey. Uh. Just get your ass down here._

It wasn't even a minute later that Dean was in the passenger's seat, next to him. Castiel looked over at him and then away quickly, frowning at the road in front of him. Something was tugging at his heart and he felt like he would very much just like to take a really long nap right then. He wasn't tired, but a little escape from the world, from missing Gabes and shit angels to random archangels, would be very, very nice.

And it really hit him then that—what if. What if there were some of Azazel's demons leftover, and they were on the lookout for the winner of Azazel's little contest. Since Jake was dead and Gabriel wasn't, that would make him the sole survivor, the winner. It seemed like the winner of that whole ordeal, the one that would become the leader of legions of demons for Azazel's army for whatever purpose, was pretty damn important to a whole shit ton of those assholes. A fear like an icy hand gripped his heart and squeezed hard as he realized that it was very possible that they could've gotten to him and were chipping away at the wall holding up the memories Samuel blocked for Gabriel. And if they chipped that wall away… what would be left of his brother? If they ever found him again, would there be any Gabe left to save?

"Dean," he said, the word coming out so much more desperately than he had wanted to greet Dean with, but there it was and there was no changing it. "We need your help. Please. I… I'm sorry if I offended you or something before." The last thing he needed was for there to be a pissed off angel on their shoulders, all haughty and shit about being snapped at by a puny human or something. He didn't think Dean was that kind of angel, but he really didn't know what he did or didn't truly know about him.

"You shouldn't apologize," Dean said, voice not unkind but not really holding any emotion at all. "I shouldn't have held it from you. You must understand, though, Castiel, I had no choice. It _had_ to happen. I… I was scared that if I stopped it, they would kill me. I can't say anymore, but… This is all for the best, okay? You have to trust me."

He wanted so badly for Cas to believe him, but he couldn't will himself too. Instead, he pulled over into the nearest parking lot, one for a gas station, realizing that Dean could fly him. "I need you to come with me to the roadhouse. Gabriel has gone missing again."

Dean frowned more. "That isn't supposed to happen."

"Not everything's going to happen exactly like your fucking angelic _plan_, Dean, and he is missing, so I don't care if it wasn't _supposed _to happen, it did. And we need your help. Balthazar is calling Adam and Samuel's already on it."

"Of course I will help you, Cas," he said, letting out a little breath that resembled something of a short sigh. Cas slipped his keys and phone into his pocket, getting out of the car when they were parked and getting his bag from the backseat. He locked the car after Dean had gotten out. "Do you wish for me to fly you there, then?"

"Yeah," he said, nodding and waiting for it.

Dean reached for his hand, but thankfully decided against that and flew them to the roadhouse by touching Cas's shoulder. As soon as they were there, Cas saw Balthazar at the bar, worrying with Ellen while Ash worked his magic at tracking Gabriel in some crazy smart way. Cas went to his younger brother quickly. He looked relieved to see Cas there.

"Hey, man," he said. "They haven't found anything. Adam's not answering and Samuel hasn't checked in."

"It'll be okay, we'll find him," he reassured him, patting is shoulder and smiling at him despite the fact that he didn't feel the smile at all. He pulled it off to the best of his ability, though, and fortunately he had some experience in faking smiles and optimism for the sake of his little brothers.

Balthazar didn't smile back but he seemed maybe a little bit less panicked, so Cas went to Ash to see how he was doing, knowing he didn't need to check on his brother anymore. His brothers came first of course, over everything.

"So are you finding anything?" he asked Ash.

He shook his head, mullet shaking along with it. "No, it's just like he's disappeared off the face of the Earth."

That was the last thing Castiel wanted to hear. He sighed and tried to think of something to say, some question he needed to be asking, but he was drawing a blank completely. He turned back to go to Balthazar and saw Dean finish speaking with him and then disappear to start his search, or so Castiel assumed. When he went back over, he didn't ask, not really wanting to talk about Dean.

Balthazar and Castiel both took seats at the bar while they waited for something to happen, somewhere to go, some course of action to take. It would be unwise to just go out in the Impala. They didn't know what in the fucking hell happened to him. He could've been literally anywhere, and the Impala couldn't exactly travel like an angel could, couldn't sense things like an angel. Although, Castiel noted, that would be one badass car.

Ellen and Jo were hovering between helping Ash with information and checking to see if Castiel and Balthazar were okay.

"I hope he's not missing like he was before," Balthazar said. "I hope it's not more of Azazel's demons."

"I was thinking of that," Castiel admitted with a sigh. "But it can't be, can it? Surely they're not still looking for him. Surely they… I don't know. Surely not." He didn't know any real or substantial reasons why it couldn't plausibly be Azazel's demons come to claim their prize and take him back in all of his vicious glory as he apparently was before Samuel's convenient memory wipe. Good old mysterious Samuel to the rescue.

There was something up about Sam deciding to join them just like that, but he wouldn't say anything about that until there was enough evidence to prove it. He was not keen to piss off an archangel over nothing. What would that be? Arch-smiting? Just plain ultra-smiting? Whatever it would be, he was pretty fucking sure that it would suck ass he would very much like to prefer an extra-quick shortcut down to hell via an ass-sucking pissy archangel's divine hand.

"Do you boys want drinks?" Ellen asked them, eyeing them sympathetically.

"Yeah, please," Balthazar said with a short nod.

"Thanks, Ellen," Castiel said as he leaned forward against the bar, feeling defeated and scared and immensely worried. Why did Gabriel have to keep going missing?

And then there he was. In the middle of the fucking bar with the blonde demon flying him, both of them smiling and the Colt in Gabriel's hand.

"What the hell," Castiel said, getting up from his seat as soon as he saw the demon and scrambling to get behind the bar to get holy water, repeating over and over in his mind, _He can't be possessed. He can't be possessed. He can't be possessed. _But he very well could be, and Castiel's heart thumped painfully at the thought of it. _Can't be, can't be, can't be. _It was pointless and useless but it _couldn't be._

Jo was on it before he was, and the holy water sizzled the skin of the blonde demon, but Gabriel was clean. He stepped protectively in front of the demon—fucking protectively—and looked at all of their stunned and angry and confused faces. It took him a second to gather the words to speak to explain whatever bullshit was going on there, but he managed to after a moment. By then, Castiel was seething and just wanted to know what the hell was going on.

"Okay, look, I don't like the idea of working with a demon either," he said. "But she said she can help with Cas's issue, and she and I went on a case. And she made more bullets for the Colt. She's on our side, at least for now I guess."

The bar was silent despite this news for a second. Castiel hoped everyone else was silent for the same reason he was: no one could believe they were being expected to trust and work with a demon, the same sons of bitches that killed people they all cared about all around them.

But then, how could any of them speak out when there was a demon behind Gabriel that looked pretty ticked at being holy watered and didn't seem like it was her idea of the best time ever to work with them? None of them wanted to get their insides carved out, so they all kept their mouths shut.

"Well, since all of you seem like you want to shove a bag of salt down my throat, I think I'll be going," the demon said, waving at all of them pleasantly. At least, pleasantly in the most sarcastic manner that Castiel was sure was physically possible, as was most demons' wont. They were so fucking happy to shove an ass load of sarcasm down the throats of anyone they were around. "I'm Ruby, by the way. But I might be seeing some of you. Particularly you, Cassie." She grinned at him and disappeared.

Castiel glared at the space she'd been in and turned to Gabriel, now ready to scold him like he was a child all over again and he'd done something wrong. But wasn't that pretty much the case? Gabriel was only nineteen and he had done something definitely wrong.

"What the fuck were you thinking?" he snapped furiously, stepping toward him and glaring at him. "What the _hell_ did you think you would achieve from going off with a goddamn demon, Gabriel?"

"I didn't!" he said, frowning at him slightly. "She took me out of my room this morning, and didn't really give me much of a choice but to go with her. I think she really does want to help, at least with this. She said the person he need to be looking for about your deal is Lilith, and she has a thing against Lilith, I guess."

"You guess? Yeah, you guess. This is all a guess," he said. "Do you know how worried we were? I prayed to fucking Dean for you, Gabriel. He and Samuel are out there searching their asses off because of this."

"I told you I didn't have a choice!" he said defensively. "And now I think we can trust her!"

…

Before Cas answered, he room was suddenly filled with unmistakable divine fury as two sets of wings flapped into the room. Samuel stalked over to Gabriel like he was his prey and stood towering over him, the power practically crackling around him like static electricity as he raised his hand and pressed Gabriel up against the bar without touching him. "You stupid human," he snarled, voice low and dangerous. Gabriel's chest felt tight and constricted under the weight of the power pressing him against the bar.

"Get away from him!" he heard a few of the others around them shout, but Sam used more of his power to keep them away from him. Gabriel felt fear racing through him and thought, _Yep. This is it. I'm going to die._ He wasn't at all prepared too, of course, but his stupid ass mind decided to make that comment so he just felt all the more sunshiny at being pinned against a bar by a furious archangel.

"I will not harm him," he snapped at the others. He focused his attention back on Gabriel. "I thought you were worth my time, but you are not proving to be so, Gabriel. Do you know how outrageously _moronic_ it is of you to not only trust that demon but allow her to take you to make more bullets for a silly gun after the case was already over." Gabriel opened his mouth to speak, but shut it under the force of Samuel's glare. "I know you were forced to go on the case, but the rest is purely your stupidity."

"I'm sorry," he managed to get out after a second, and then it felt as is his jaw was glued shut after that.

"Do not apologize," he said, stepping away and letting him free. With a shake of the head, he said, "Please only call me if you wish me to help with Castiel's issue. I don't want to waste my time on your problems with that demon, and I certainly don't want to be around you in my spare time when you prefer to be around the likes of demons."

With that, Samuel disappeared, and the roadhouse was more silent than it had even been before.


	19. Chapter 19

**Ahh this is late isn't it? I had a crappy time writing it. But here it is finally.**

**So I realize my schedule on this is absolutely shit and I'll try to make myself update regularly from now on, and because that isn't very likely to happen, I'm going to start posting on Tumblr when I've updated on here if you all want to check that out so it's easier to follow. I'll use the tag brokenandwhole or b&amp;w or something like that, and I'll probably make a little tag thing on my sidebar on my Tumblr. So yeah. My tumblr iss casdeansam. Alsooo, if anyone ever wanted to talk about it? Because someone on ao3 said they wanted to and it would seriously make my day if I got a message about it. So if you do, just message me on Tumblr and that'd be really awesome. **

* * *

_With that, Samuel disappeared, and the roadhouse was more silent than it had even been before._

_…_

They left the roadhouse shortly after, despite the fact that Balthazar and Gabriel had intended to stay there for a while. A few days away from each other were probably needed, but instead the three of them piled into the Impala and drove off to a motel halfway across the country in Virginia. Why they went there, they didn't know. They just kept driving, Castiel playing music loudly and drowning out all of his thoughts with the sound of Gabriel's albums over and over.

They got a room with two beds and a couch, so Gabriel and Balthazar slept on the beds and Castiel on the couch, staring up at the ceiling for half of the night and hearing faint echoes of imagined hellhounds' growls as they edged closer and closer to him, their growls seeming to purr his name ominously. When sleep finally took him over and seemed to intend to keep him there for a long while, he found that it wasn't the kind of sleep he was looking for; it was plagued with nightmares, until a familiar figure came and drove all the black-eyed versions of himself sporting leashes with invisible hellhounds barking at him on the end away, and turned to face him, green eyes shining through the darkness of the dreamed nighttime.

"Cas," he breathed quickly and quietly, "I'm real. This is a dream but I'm real. I need to tell you something."

Cas hadn't realized that he could really move, so when he went over to Dean it was a bit of a shock to him. It was an impulse, since he didn't even think it would've been possible, but here he was, staring into those eyes and then hugging the owner tightly. "You're leaving," he said. They weren't bonded anymore, but Castiel knew Dean. He was leaving, and the ache in Castiel was very real, and very not-dreamlike.

He felt rather than saw Dean nod, because he was hugging Dean very tightly and didn't really see anything, his eyes shut tightly. "I'm sorry," Dean's gentle voice said. "I don't want to, but if I don't, I'll fall. Adam is falling, you know. They're just letting us drop."

"Showing all the borderline ones what happens?" Cas guessed.

"I think so. You know I'm sorry about everything, right? And I'll be back as soon as I can, I swear," he said quietly.

He didn't move or say anything for a second, too caught up in the fact that he still loathed what Dean had done to him by keeping so many things from him. But at the same time, something in him knew that he had to. He couldn't honestly ask him to fall from grace for him and his stupid cause, a cause he literally knew almost nothing about. And finally a wave of forgiveness washed over him like tide rising on the shore, and he hugged Dean tighter, feeling the true gravity of what was happening. Dean was leaving. Dean was going back to heaven. Who knew what they would do to him for him choosing Castiel over them so quickly.

And holy shit, Dean had chosen Castiel over heaven before.

"I'm gonna miss you," he said quietly.

Dean patted his back slightly. "I'll be back," he said again. "And we'll go on another road trip when I come back, okay?"

"I swear if you don't make sure that happens I'll kick your ass, Dean," he said, mostly playfully. But you know. He really thought he might kick his ass if he even dared to try to turn all angel-y and detached and weird on him again, because that was not the Dean he knew and not the Dean he cared to be around or associate himself with in whatever batshit apocalyptic chaos that was in store for him.

"I have to go now," he said, that being the only warning he gave, because the next thing Castiel knew, he was back in the motel bed and staring at the motel ceiling.

He sat up and saw that Balthazar was sitting up too. He realized as the light from the signs outside caught on his little brother's face that it was tearstained, and he was hastily trying to wipe all the evidence of crying from his cheeks. Cas had already seen, though, and he stood, crossing the room to his brother's bed and sitting up next to him.

"What was it about?" he whispered to him. Nightmares weren't foreign to the Novaks. Sure, before all of this big blowup of demonic and angelic business, they were few and far in-between, but when they did come, they were horrible. Now they were certainly more frequent an occurrence for Cas, even if he couldn't always remember what they were when he woke up. He didn't know about his brothers, but he'd had suspicions some nights.

"Jess," he breathed out. "And Dad. And—and you." He wiped at his eyes again and looked over at Cas. "Jess and Dad on the ceiling, you below them with big dogs ripping away at you."

"It's okay," he said quietly, trying to be reassuring. He didn't know what to say about Jess and their father, seeing as they were dead and the consolation for that would be long overdue. But he could at least say, "I'm here. I'm okay. I'm sorry, Balthy."

He shook his head. "I'm just scared about you, Cassie. Gabe and I need you. I don't know what we'd do if we lost you too."

"You'd keep hunting and raise hell on my behalf," he told him, and smiled slightly despite the fact that he didn't want to smile at any of this at all. "I'm scared, too, but I'd go to hell and back a thousand times for you and Gabe. So don't worry about me, man. I don't care what happens down there. If you two are safe up here, I'm happy."

"We're horrible fucking hunters compared to you," he said quietly. "Mom taught you best."

"Mom—you know what? Fuck what Mom did. She was a bitch," he said in frustration.

Balthazar frowned slightly. "Cas, why are you saying that?"

"'Cause it's true. You know how she was," he said. "I don't want to think about her, okay? Hell, I'm glad if I have to die, I get to die knowing I'm not leaving you guys with her."

"Are you saying you're glad she's dead?" he said, raising his eyebrows.

"I don't know what I'm saying." He thought about Dean's promise to come back and take him on another road trip, and fuck. He was just fucked up. He was so messed up. He hated his fucking mom, and he was going to die so he had every goddamn right to say whatever he wanted about her anyway, after all she'd done to fuck up his short life.

He missed Dean. He wanted to talk to Dean about everything. Why did one dream that could actually turn out to be all fake entirely change his opinion on Dean?

He sighed as he looked at Balthazar again. "We should go back to sleep," he said, and that was all he wanted to do right then. A dreamless, content sleep was about the best thing in the world to him right then.

He nodded, and Cas was sure that neither of them would be getting any good sleep, but he went back over to the couch anyway.

…

Samuel came briefly the next morning to report that he was working on looking for Lilith, who was the person holding Cas's deal. Gabriel didn't look up at him when he felt his eyes boring into him, afraid of what that gaze would hold, afraid of how much disappointment and hate one archangel could force through two human eyes.

They didn't go on a case the next day, so he went out and ran. It was a smallish town, so he ran to the other end. It was easy to focus on the movement of his legs, his breathing, the music he was blaring in his earphones at the stoplight as he waited to cross. It was easy to get lost in not thinking about anything he should've been thinking about, and it made the run almost blissful for how happy he was to just lose the anger and pain he was feeling toward just generally everything.

Eventually he was hungry and sick of running, though, so he headed back to their motel to find the doors locked and the Impala gone. He sighed in frustration and turned the music off of his phone, took the earphones out, and pulled up Balthazar's contact on his phone. For some reason, he felt really distanced from Cas after returning from his stay in the Croatoan town that he didn't even remember. He thought he should've felt distanced from Balthazar, who left him for Stanford, but it was Cas who he just didn't feel was the same.

But then again, when he first saw Cas after he had literally died, he had gone through months of chaos, learning that angels were real and that he was, like, weirdly bonded to one, and he had sold his soul. So maybe he had a bit of a right to be a little different.

Balthazar answered quickly. "I'm inside, if you're back," he said as soon as he did. "I just got out of the shower, so hang on."

"Okay," Gabriel said, before hanging up and waiting. When the door opened, Balthazar was in a towel. Gabriel moved past him and went toward the bathroom. "Where'd Cas go?" he asked as he went, stopping and leaning against the doorway when he got there.

"Get us something to eat," he said, shrugging a little bit. "I think he just wanted to drive."

"Gets his mind off things," Gabriel said, because he knew that after a complicated hunt where the decision they had to make didn't always seem like the best decision possible, or where they couldn't save someone, or where it stumped them just too much, he'd go on a drive. After Balthazar and their Mom both left, and he stopped drowning all of that pain in sarcasm and alcohol, he went on a lot of drives alone.

"He's had a lot going on lately," he said, holding his towel up over his waist as he got clothes out of his bag. "So have we, though."

"Yeah." He let out a breath. "Are you mad at me about Ruby, Balth?"

He looked over at him. "I don't know. I think it was stupid as hell, but if you trust her, you should've brought us along so we could be there just in case. I'm not saying you had bad judgment with this or anything, but it's good to be safe rather than sorry with demons, you know."

"Yeah, I know. I've been thinking about that," he said. "I'm just upset that Sam and Cas are so pissed at me."

He nodded. "I don't know about Sam since he's all archangel-y, but Cas just…" He thought for a moment before shaking his head again. "Cas is Cas, you know. To him, monsters are monsters. Trustworthiness isn't a factor. I think part of it has to do with Dean, too. If he can't even trust angels, how is he supposed to trust a demon?"

"That makes sense." He looked away from his brother and up at the ceiling. He felt so tiny and young and inexperienced with everything right then. It was all tremendously unfair. He wanted to just go back to the way things were with working the simple cases with Balthazar and Castiel before all the tension with Balthazar going to college arose and all the drama with angels and his disappearance came. He didn't want to deal with this demon, even if he did trust her, and he didn't want the apocalypse weighing down on their shoulders with him being a big part of it.

Balthazar seemed to sense his distress. "It's okay," he said reassuringly. "Stuff sucks lately, and even if we're all screwed to hell and dealing with a bunch of different shit, we've got each other. You, me, and Cassie. We've got that, right?"

He nodded, wanting to go back to sleep badly until they had a case, because he knew a case was all that would keep his mind off things. So he went over to his bed, abandoning the shower that he was going to take. He slipped off his shoes and moved under the covers.

When he woke up, it was to Balthazar shaking him violently. He felt like he'd only been asleep for twenty minutes. He looked at the clock and found that it was only about half an hour after he'd shut his eyes. "What?" he asked, annoyed at being up instead of napping.

"Ruby's outside," he said in a whispering voice. Gabriel frowned and sat up quickly. "You go talk to her. I don't know if she'll react well to me answering the door or not. She's kind of a bitch and all."

Gabriel nodded in agreement because, well, she was. He slipped to the door and opened it slowly. Ruby was there, curly blonde hair draped over her shoulders and blowing a little bit in the breeze as she waited what seemed like rather impatiently for him. "Finally," she muttered, brushing past him and into the motel room without being invited.

"Whoa, hang on," Balthazar said warily, eyes wide as he watched her in very obvious discomfort. He stepped away from her when she turned her gaze on him, even though Gabriel didn't think the gaze was anywhere near angry or anything. "What are you doing?"

Ruby looked at Gabriel now, speaking to him but answering Balthazar's question. "I found another case for us," she said. "Not you, Balthazar."

He rolled his eyes. "Hell no. If you two go on a case, I'm coming too."

"I promised I'd take him or Cas if we went on another case," Gabriel told her. Their last case had been pretty enjoyable, actually. She was a good hunting partner, once you got over the fact that she was a demon, and she was pretty bitchy but she was funny once she stopped being bitchy to you. And she really did seem like she was all for their side of things.

"Well, screw them," she said, rolling her eyes. "I'm not going with them."

"Then I'm not going," Gabriel told her, frowning as well. He shouldn't have been so defiant to the demon, seeing as he didn't have any holy water or devil's traps ready, but oh well. He was pretty sure she wouldn't hurt him. Not sure enough to warrant defying her, but sure enough that maybe saying one defiant thing wouldn't amount to much.

He thought maybe Balthazar and Cas were more experienced with dealing with demons because of the time when he was missing, but he was still far out of the loop with all of that. The only two demons he was very experienced with were Ruby and Yellow Eyes. Azazel. Whatever.

"Yes, you are," she said, not exactly demanding but doubtful of his want to resist going. And it was true that he really wanted to go on the case, but he wouldn't go without Balthazar. He'd promised. She stepped forward, said, "I'll have him back eventually," and then teleported them out of the motel before anyone could protest.

Gabriel jumped slightly when they'd landed. "Ruby," he said irritably, "you can't just do that!"

"I think I can," she replied, smirking at him, and then started to explain the hunt.

…

He came back from his long drive to find Gabriel missing from the motel and Balthazar worrying his head off.

"He's fine, apparently," Balthazar huffed out, the irritation and fear obvious in his tone as Cas moved to get out his phone. "He left his phone here, man. Ruby just took him on a hunt before I could stop her."

"She was here?" he asked, eyebrows raised. Great. Fucking great. "Shit, what—what—shit."

"Yeah. Shit. Fucking really bad shit."

They had nothing to do but sit and wait there after that, so that was exactly what they did. Samuel returned while they were waiting, which took their mind off of things.

"I heard that Ruby took Gabriel," he said, looking between them, a cross between worry and annoyance mingling on his borrowed face. His vessel was really tall.

"I couldn't stop her," Balthazar told him, before he got all smite-y at them for losing his favorite human. "And Cas was gone, he didn't know."

"I'm not blaming you." Samuel stepped away from them, around the motel, pacing up and down, not saying anything but seeming to be thinking very hard about something he should say. Castiel and Balthazar were both silent while they watched him do this, waiting for something to happen. "I'll find him, bring him back here. I do not…" He sighed. "I do not wish for him to be tainted by her."

"Yeah, well, that'd be appreciated," Cas said, trying to sound as respectful as possible. He didn't think it worked very well. He wasn't very good at the respectful gig.

Samuel turned his gaze down to Cas, and for a second he thought it was all archangel wrath and shit, and some seriously unfortunate smiting was about to happen. He flinched slightly when Samuel's hand rose, but it was only so the angel could run it through his hair. "I don't wish to go back home," he said, looking upwards toward his home, Heaven. "I don't wish for there to be a war. But there will be."

"Yeah, we kinda got that," Cas said, unsure of why he was saying this.

"It's upsetting to me that you humans have to be in the middle of this," he said. "It's upsetting to me that there has to be hunters at all. When I left home, I hunted a lot. To take the weight of humans' shoulders and to learn more about you. I like it. And now you're all unprotected and it turns out that not even an archangel out smiting all the things I can get my hands on helps. Even I am meaningless in this plot of theirs. I love my Father with all of my heart, but I don't see how He can be happy with His creations slaughtering each other. I don't see why He has not butted in yet."

He looked down at Cas, eyes narrowed in a very angelic way. "I'm telling you this, Castiel, because you don't trust me. Despite that you seem to be so desperately in love with my brother and this cause of yours, you don't trust me. I am driven by love just as you are. My love for you, for my brothers and sisters who have fallen and will continue to do so because they don't think this is what our Father would want either.

"And I am helping you because there is something about us that is connected, more than just in this war. There's… _something,_ only in a handful of us. You, your brothers, me, Dean, Adam, a few other angels, and a few other humans. There is… _something._" He seemed so upset about not knowing what this something was that it unnerved Castiel, overwhelming everything else he felt about the whole speech. He felt that something too, now that he thought about it. There was something… not right.

"I trust you," Cas said after a second, because he did, a little.

He nodded slightly and turned to Balthazar, to see if he did as well. When Balthazar nodded, and he seemed satisfied, he nodded in goodbye to them and flew off.

"That was weird as hell," Balthazar muttered when Samuel was gone, and Castiel nodded. "But he seemed pretty sincere. And hey, what was he saying about '_desperately_ in love' with Dean?" Balthazar was grinning from ear to ear.

Castiel turned a glare on him. "You shut right the hell up."

"No, no, man, we're kinda stuck here. Let's talk about this," he said. He was joking and serious at the same time.

Castiel groaned. "I'm never going to live that shit down, am I?"

"Hell no. Now, really, let's talk," he said. "As much as I'd love to hear what you have to say about Dean, I think we should be a little worried about that creepy '_something_' Samuel mentioned."

"Yeah, that seemed ominous as hell," he said, frowning slightly.

"Made sense, though, didn't it?" he said. "I think that's what was the most ominous about it."

Cas nodded in agreement and let out a breath. "I hate all of this shit."

He nodded. "I liked it better when we hardly dealt with demons and we didn't know angels existed."

Castiel knew that Balthazar knew he agreed, so he didn't say anything. He just lay back in his bed and waited for Samuel to return Gabriel.

…

When they returned, it seemed like Gabriel had received a real scolding. He sank into his bed like an upset puppy that'd just done something bad and had gotten told no sternly for it.

Samuel stood there for a moment, visibly feeling awkward as hell. "Adam is coming to watch you three," he said after a second. "I'm going to look for Lilith more."

"Isn't Adam falling?" Balthazar asked, frowning.

Samuel nodded. "Apparently Dean begged him to stay to prevent his fall, but he doesn't care, I suppose. He wants to help you."

"Great," Cas said. "I don't see why we even need an angelic babysitter all the freaking time."

"Well, when we left you unsupervised before, you sold you soul. But we could have prevented that, so we let it go. And now when we leave you alone, Ruby comes and takes Gabriel," he said. He turned his gaze to Balthazar. "And you—I have heard that the demons you worked with have started to look for you again. It isn't safe to leave you alone."

Cas let out a puff of breath, irritated that his reasoning made sense.

"He should be here any moment," Samuel said. "If he doesn't show up, pray to me and I'll come." He disappeared in the vague sound of wings flapping and they both turned to Gabriel.

"He chewed me out in the middle of the case and nearly smote Ruby," Gabriel said, looking up between them, his scolded puppy look still making him look sorry as hell and making it almost impossible to stay angry with him. "There's really nothing wrong with her, I'm telling you guys. She's just, you know, a demon, so she doesn't get human stuff, I guess."

Neither Castiel nor Balthazar said anything. It wasn't his fault she took him, so they weren't angry at him for that, but they didn't want to listen to him trying to persuade them about the demon. Neither of them was going to be convinced about her, or Castiel was at least sure that he definitely wouldn't be, and he would guess that Balthazar wouldn't be either.

Adam showed up soon, looking weary and beat up but as Adam-y as ever. They hadn't seen him since before hell spilled out a shit ton of demons and he sold his soul. They needed to look for a demon case. It was their fault they were all out, after all. But they'd been sat on their asses, catered to by a bunch of angels who were intent on spoiling them and threatening to smite them at the same time.

"Hey, how are all of you?" he said, crashing down into a chair but looking as upbeat as he probably possibly could with all of the weight bearing down on him. He realized that Adam, too, was choosing them over his grace, over heaven. Even Dean had gone back up there to prevent his fall, but here was Adam, simply because he was a pretty good guy.

"How are you is the question," Cas said, frowning at him. "You look like shit."

The Novak way of showing you care was so affectionate.

"I'm fine," he said, sighing slightly. "A little scared, though."

"Well, yeah, you're falling so you can help three little jackass humans," Cas said, going and sitting down on the couch he'd been sleeping on.

"That is pretty scary," Adam agreed, leaning back in his seat and looking up at the ceiling. "I thought a while ago that I was going to fall and I made my peace with it. I don't need my grace. I'm not going to voluntarily rip it out. It's way too useful and part of me for that. But if it's between keeping it and serving the wrong cause and losing it to serve the right one, which I am reluctant to admit is three little jackass humans, I'll choose losing it."

Cas nodded, and before he could say anything, Balthazar cut in with: "What's it with you angels and making all these memorable speeches?"

Adam raised an eyebrow.

"At least yours wasn't as weird as Samuel's was," he said.

"Oh," Adam said, understanding slightly and nodding. "Yeah, he likes weird, kinda mushy speeches. I only just met him but I think that's his thing."

"Oh, great," Balthazar said, grinning slightly. "So we'll be hearing more of those."

Adam smiled at him a little bit and nodded. "It's such a joy to know that you've got at least that to look forward to, huh?"

"Yep. I don't know what I'd do without it," he said, smiling at him and sinking back in his bed. None of them were tired, Cas knew, but there was nothing else to do if they couldn't go on a case but to sit and wait.

"I'm sure you'd be lost," Adam said, but all the playfulness drained from him as he exhaled out a long sigh. "Hey, Cas, I talked to Dean. He told me to say hi. Said something else but I don't remember what it was and I don't think it was very important."

"Oh," Cas said. He nodded and fiddled with the amulet around his neck idly, looking down at it.

Adam nodded slightly. "I'm sorry, Cas," he said.

He shook his head. "I don't know why. I want everyone to stop being sorry for me."

They were all quiet in the motel for a moment, and Castiel was glad. He lay down and pulled a blanket over him, shutting his eyes and slowly evening out his breaths. In pretending to fall asleep, he soon really did.


	20. Chapter 20

**Oops it's been a long time. Gah. Well, this chapter was stupid and wouldn't come out but here it is.**

* * *

_They were all quiet in the motel for a moment, and Castiel was glad. He lay down and pulled a blanket over him, shutting his eyes and slowly evening out his breaths. In pretending to fall asleep, he soon really did._

_…_

Gabriel woke up one morning with seven months ticking down on Cas's clock to the sound of incessant banging on the door. He was up in an instant, pulling pants on and reaching for the knife under his pillow. Cas and Balthazar were up too, but he was the one that edged over to the window and moved the curtains aside slightly to reveal the person that worked at the front desk looking irritated as he pounded at the door.

Of course. Goddamn humans. At least demons and angels had the decency to politely pop straight into the room and wake them up gently. Fucking knocking at the door until they jumped awake like the whole sky had just crashed down on them—that was pretty inconsiderate.

He sighed and stashed his knife away, answering the door and raising an uninterested eyebrow at the guy. He was short—shorter than even Gabe, and that was a real feat—and had beady, dark eyes. He was stout and kind of reminded Gabriel of an annoyed little mushroom for how his legs weren't proportional to his body at all, and once you moved passed the knees it all ballooned out from there. There was no problem with being overweight, he guessed, no need to shame it or anything—but damn, guy. That was just some really bad luck, with the way nature dealt him his mushroom-y figure.

"Are you paying for another day or not? 'Cause I could use your room if you're not," the guy snapped at him, and he had a kind of high-pitched, mousy voice to match his mousy eyes.

"I dunno, man," he said, voice rough and groggy from him just waking up. He ran a hand through his hair and looked back at the clock. "Checkout isn't for another four hours, though. Can't you just let us sleep?" Seriously, dude. He knew he would've woken up naturally not long after this, but he would've preferred to get all the sleep he could in.

"Are you staying another night or not?" the guy asked.

Well, fuck you too, mushroom-mouse guy. "I don't know," he said, frowning at him and his rudeness after unkindly waking them up at—what? Seven in the morning. Wasn't even that early. Ugh. He wanted to go back to sleep. "Ask again in four hours."

They would probably leave before then, but whatever. Gabriel shut the door on the guy and went back into his brothers, who were yawning and sitting up with what looked like great reluctance. Cas was already on his phone, had it pressed up to his ear, eyes half-closed as he muttered and disinterested, "Uh-huh. Uh-huh. What about it. Uh-huh. Fuck. No, really, I'm listening. Yeah, why else would I have said fuck. Well, yeah, fuck. Okay. Yeah, okay, Bobby. Yeah, I get it, Bobby."

He looked around for a second and realized Adam wasn't there. He looked at Balthazar and frowned. "Where's Adam?" he asked.

"He woke me up right before the guy started banging on the door and told me he'd get us breakfast," Balthazar said. He rubbed at his sleepy eyes and let out a yawn that caused Gabriel to yawn too.

When Cas was done either half-listening or totally ignoring Bobby, he set his phone down and ran a hand over his face, frowning slightly when he was done. Probably from all that stubble. It was almost a beard. Cas never let it get like that. Something nagged at him in the back of his mind about Cas sporting a beard like that—something with a _P?_ Whatever it was, it wasn't important. Point was, his brother needed a shave.

"Well, Balthy, Bobby says Ash has caught wind of a demon sporting your best bud's meat suit tramping around again," Cas muttered, looking over at him. "Going by 'Megan' now. I wonder if the bitch really thought we were stupid enough to not notice that."

For how calm Castiel seemed, Balthazar looked downright terrified at the mention of this "Megan." It was, yet again, another thing he didn't understand because of his time away from them, and he let out an irritated sigh. Would there ever be an end to all of the things he didn't understand because of his time as Azazel's little bitch?

"What's she doing?" Balthazar asked nervously, looking over at Gabriel and almost wincing. Whatever he did with this Megan girl, whoever she was—and by the way Cas said "meat suit," he was sure she was a demon—it was bad, if he didn't even want to look Gabe in the eye because of it.

"What's going on?" Gabriel asked, frowning slightly and looking between his brothers.

"Balthazar worked with some demons while you were gone to try to get to you," Cas said with a heavy sigh as he went and sat down on his bed, pulling his bag up next to him and rifling through it, pulling out the guns and the holy water. "We'd best not hole up here for that. Best thing to do is to get to Bobby's, if we can make it."

"She's not looking for us, is she?" Balthazar asked, eyes wide, and after that Gabriel kind of tuned them out for a second because _whoa._ Balthazar worked with _fucking demons._ That wasn't a good whoa, either; that was a _you're a real fucking idiot and I'm going to chop you the fuck in half because of how idiotic you are_ whoa. That was a whoa of _yeah no wonder Cas is pissed_.

He was, too. Gabriel had spent too many days locked in constant contact with his oldest brother to not be able to tell the signs of when Cas was pissed enough that it was time to step back and take a breather. Cas's anger didn't scare him, or anyone else for that matter, but damn, when he got the disappointed look on his face, it was time to get him to reevaluate how worthy of anger the situation was before he started reflecting all the things in life that made him mad. When he got like that, he went to bars, and it was hard to get him back out of them.

Gabriel almost felt closest to him when he was angry like this. It wasn't like he did this so often that it was just natural for Gabriel to see him like that. It was just that it happened enough that, amongst all the other crazy changes, to see this one old constant was, well, reassuring, as fucked up as that was.

Gabriel couldn't say anything about this, though, couldn't get him to breathe and move past. How do you move past your own brother working with demons, no matter what it is that he's doing with them?

Oh. _Oh._ Fuck.

Ruby.

Fuck, Ruby was no different than "Megan."

But Ruby was _helping them_, rather than the alternative of Gabriel helping the demons. That was the difference. But he felt something roiling inside him, spewing up a lot of red hot anger and guilt and upset like lava ready to peak up out of the volcano and then blow out and leave him and everything around him devastated.

He was convinced Ruby was different. If he didn't convince himself of this, he was going to get upset and then he was going to have to sit down and contemplate everything and lately everything was just too much to contemplate, especially in the middle of a goddamn war that needed fighting, and if he were to attempt to contemplate the war in the middle of the war, everyone around him would end up dead because he'd be too busy contemplating, which would pile up a lot more shit to contemplate. So. No contemplating. It was for the best that he convinced himself that Ruby was different.

He had gone to work with her several times, some with and some without Castiel or Gabriel, and one awkward as hell time with Sam glaring at her the whole time. Adam stayed with them consistently, falling more and more every day. It was imperceptible to the blind eye, but if he thought about a week ago Adam and looked at today Adam, Gabriel knew the difference.

He was invaluable with their work with finding a ton of sons of bitches demons despite this, though, but there was one demon, Lilith, the one that wanted his head on a stick for being the winner of Azazel's special kid contest, that he couldn't find, and neither could Samuel, surprisingly.

When Gabriel zoned back into the conversation, Cas was looking at him and raising an eyebrow. "Dude, you really spaced out."

He nodded slightly and looked down at his lap, swallowing. He wanted to leave there and take a break, a little trip that lasted a long while, like maybe a journey to Stanford to take a shot at the apple pie life like Balthazar did. He wondered how much Balthazar missed the apple pie life he had before Jessica died, the medical career he had going for him.

"Sorry. What'd you say?" he asked.

"I asked if you're ready to head out. We're going to try to get to Bobby's, hole up there until we get a plan on how to exorcise all Meg's little bitches," he said. He stood up, shoving a few remaining things in his duffel before zipping it up and slinging it over his shoulder. Gabriel and Balthazar packed their duffels too, and the three of them headed out of the motel without further discussion—_avoiding_ the whiny concierge on the way as Balthazar called Adam to tell him to meet them at Bobby's.

Gabriel was in the passenger's seat in the Impala. He looked out the window and then forward at the dashboard and imagined what the damn car would be like without Cas over there in the driver's seat. He imagined Balthazar there in Cas's seat, the new eldest living Novak in the world, the new head man of the Impala. He imagined waging this stupid fucking war of demons without him, without their big brother. At least he wouldn't be alone, but he couldn't do it without Cas.

Why couldn't Cas see that? Why was he so selfish that he didn't see how much it hurt Gabriel to know that Cas was going to be torn to shreds but bloodthirsty hellhounds and he was going to be left in their hellhole of a world with the sole responsibility of Cas's death lying on his shoulders forever?

He wasn't _ready_ for this. He felt so insignificant and small. None of them were ready. How could they expect him to be? He was _nineteen_, and Cas twenty-three, and Balthazar twenty-one. He had a fucking demonic bounty on his head and he wasn't even old enough to legally drink. This was the time for him to go off to college and find out the fuck who he was, and he was about to either save the world or get the hands of a demon shoved into his chest and his heart ripped out.

He wanted to talk about all of it, but he knew the conversation would be avoided. Castiel would think he was trying to talk about _Cas's_ feelings, trying to pull them out, wouldn't realized that _Gabriel_ needed the talk. Balthazar would look at him sympathetically and say, _Cas has his reasons for everything._

But what about Gabriel? What were Gabriel's reasons? He wanted to know this. He wanted to ask what they thought _he_ should do, what they thought _he_ thought, what _his_ significance was. He needed to know that he held some level of significance, that it wasn't a total waste for Cas to bring him back, because even if they could save Cas, he'd feel like a dick for causing all the trouble.

There were no talks with Cas _whatsoever_, and now that Balthazar was here, there were still no talks. He didn't mind most of the time, but he was scared and he felt how young he was and he wanted to be understood and talked about and realized. He needed… He needed some _normalcy¸_ some real-word stuff that real-word teenagers do. He _needed_ a few years of apple pie life.

After the war and after they saved Cas, he vowed, he didn't care what monster knocked on his door. He'd sit his ass down and call another hunter because _huh-uh, no way, no thank you, monster sir, you're going to have to wait to be evil until after I'm long dead and my want for retirement in the world of normalcy has been fulfilled._

…

The day had been a bit too dull and too exciting all at once, and it was only a few hours into it. Cas was done with it already, but then again, he was done with most days rather quickly anymore. They were all the same, all as pessimistic and hopeless as before, all revealing some shitty thing that they'd have to deal with. Life liked to say, _Hey, Novaks! Remember how fucked you thought you were yesterday? Remember how you thought you actually couldn't get anymore fucked? Yeah, actually, you're way more fucked._

Hey, Life! Why don't you go fuck yourself?

The trek to Bobby's was going to be agonizingly long, agonizingly quiet save for the music, and agonizingly stressful, since at any second Life could decide to spit a few more demons out of its ass and shove it in their faces. Cas was extremely fond of Life's amazing skill at producing more and more demons straight out of its ass.

"Ash said that we're passing straight through a town with a ton of omens, but there is a group of three hunters working together and they say they have it down," Balthazar reported from the back seat, staring at his phone with a dutiful look to his face.

"How the hell does Ash know where we are?" Cas asked, glancing back at Balthazar.

"I'm guessing he found out what names we used for these and called to get our trackers turned on," he said.

"Oh. Makes sense," he said. "So're we stopping for these demons?"

"There are already hunters on it," Gabriel said. "I want to get to Bobby's."

Castiel looked over at his littlest brother. He was the littlest of the three of them, sat down in the passenger's seat and looking like he was a kid again, defenseless and young and unprotected.

"We should," he said, despite the fact that he would've preferred to stay at the town and help the hunters on the demon case. He looked at the road again, avoiding Gabriel catching his gaze narrowly and setting his eyes intently past his brother's look.

"Okay," Balthazar said, seeming relieved. Skipping this hunt was pleasing everyone but Cas, but he was okay with that. "I told Adam to meet us there anyway."

"I'm glad he let us have this car ride angel-free at least," Cas muttered, glancing up in the mirror to the backseat where Balthazar was. "I'm sick of being constantly supervised by them." Of course, he was no longer angry with Dean like he used to be, but that didn't mean it still didn't get old, being treated like little kids and always looked after.

…

At a café in Austin, Minnesota, they were scared shitless when Samuel suddenly appeared at their table, but luckily no one noticed, somehow. Cas suspected there to be some sort of magic going on for that to happen. "Hello," he said formally, looking with slightly narrowed eyes at Gabriel before looking between Balthazar and Castiel briefly.

"Uh, hey, Sam," Gabriel said. Cas looked over at him for a moment and then back at Samuel. Sam. He guessed he could call him Sam. It was less formal than Samuel, but every time he'd ever seen the guy, he was always pretty formal. "What are you here for?"

"I heard that Adam had gone ahead to Bobby's and was redoing some sigils due to the demons in search of Balthazar, so I decided to come protect you," he said. "Also, there is a case nearby that I thought you might be interested in."

"We really wanted to get back to Bobby's as quickly as possible," Cas told him, looking over at him. Sam made him feel almost uneasy. He had pictured this larger-than-life, superb, little-brother-ish angel dude that seemed like the picture-perfect image of the kind of guy Dean would adore and would sacrifice his life over and would mourn for over the course of millennia. Instead he was this… well, picture-perfect angel dick, just like the rest of them that yanked Dean out of his life for the time being.

Sam fixed his powerful stare on him. Those eyes could roast his own right out of his head, and when the archangel before him got annoyed, it was obvious. He got annoyed pretty easily, it seemed, because he was constantly radiating these tense, extremely powerful vibes. It was like being blasted with divine intention, the overwhelming sense of _oh shit I'm gonna get myself smote_ a constant in his presence.

"I want you to go on this case," he said simply, with a sense of finality that would outmatch any egotistical adult who thought they knew what the fuck they were doing when actually there was a ghost in their house that wanted to rip their throats out and would be successful if they didn't shove their ego right the fuck out of their ass so Cas and whoever he was working with could help.

That was that, basically. That was the shorter way of putting it.

As much as he was really not against arguing with the archangel, he wanted to go on a case, so he put on an irritated face—he was irritated with Sam thinking he could just snap his fingers and have everyone doing as he said—and finished eating his food quickly. When they were done, the four of them went out of the café and drove to Sam's case as he described it.

"It's just a ghost, a fairly easy case for you," he said, "but I believe that going on a case will help you, and it will give us some time to move the demons of your trail if they are indeed after you as we think they are."

He decided to sigh and nod. "So tell us about it."

"There were two girls researching into some sort of summoning ritual due to some books with them in it, and they turned out to be real rituals," he said. "These books are gaining popularity and many will continue to fall prey to the violent spirits that come when these spells are performed. I thought you might be interested in stopping the spirits."

"So what are we supposed to do?" he said, frowning slightly. He wanted to jump on the case, but how were they supposed to stop anyone from ever reading the books again?

"These rituals are connected to a few specific spirits," he said. "They were witches and wanted to cause trouble even after they died, so they created summoning spells that would bring them back to wreak havoc as spirits. Salt and burn their bones and their rituals would be useless."

"So who are they?" Balthazar asked.

Sam looked at him and with a short sigh, he shrugged. "These were smart witches that survived a long time. They cloaked themselves against us, even archangels," he told them, which was basically the long way of telling them they were fucked for this case and that they'd have a shit load of research to do.

"Can you give us anything?" Gabriel asked him.

"I suggest looking in this area," he said. "That's all I know. The deaths happen more frequently around here and are more violent. I think the spell work is strongest from here because they are buried here somewhere."

They nodded, and before they could say anymore, Sam was gone. Cas sat up straighter and looked up at his brothers. "Ready to go?"

…

As it turned out, these witches were smart sons of bitches. They covered their tracks remarkably well, which made it remarkably hard for them to get any kind of lead. They found a lot of witchcraft activity, a lot of shady deaths within a long time. They picked up the books after they figured out what they were from investigating the houses of the dead girls. And after two days of this, all they had was the ritual.

"Well, let's do the logical thing," Gabriel said, in a way that made it so both Balthazar and Cas were sure that what was about to come out of his mouth next was going to be completely _il_logical. "Let's summon the bitches."

And Balthazar and Castiel were right. It was completely illogical, but it was also basically their only option unless they wanted to drag the case out for several more days. If so much wasn't going on and they had more time, Cas would've been happier with that plan. As it was, they found the page of the rituals in the books and scrounged for all the ingredients.

This book was full of dark shit, or it had to be to have a detailed account of how to summon these witches. The girls that died summoning them were really dedicated to the books, too, or else he was sure that those smart, cosplay-type fangirls would never have gotten their hands on lamb blood and the bone of a black cat.

He wondered how they got lamb blood and the bone of a black cat anyway. That was some messed up shit.

Equipped with their ghost-fighting things, they finished up the spell and waited until the witches' spirits showed up.

These were ugly motherfuckers. There was a woman, who sported a wart on her long, pointed nose, with thin gray hair and long, bony fingers that she curved up at him while she chanted something. Gabriel shot her quickly. There was also a man, who was tall and gaunt, looking like he hadn't eaten in years. He screeched when the woman witch disappeared so Balthazar shot him. Cas quickly produced a salt circle and they stepped into it. When the witches reappeared, they were ready.

"Hang on," Balthazar said, and Cas looked over at him. "I recognize the guy."

"What the fuck kind of people did you hang out with at Stanford?" Cas muttered to him, shooting the female witch when she came back.

"No, shut up," Balthazar said, shutting his eyes tightly. Gabriel and Cas waited somewhat patiently, shooting at the spirits every time they reappeared. "History class. Fuck, that guy was in the Civil War or something…"

Cas frowned at him. A Civil War soldier into serious heavy witchcraft with his stereotypical witchy grandma. _What a great case to be sent on. Thanks, Sam,_ he thought sarcastically.

"Okay, great. So you know who they are, but now we're trapped," Gabriel said. "How are we supposed to get out?"

Cas looked over at the table that the table to bowl that they put all their witchy spell shit in. He shot the bowl, which exploded everywhere, the contents splattering around. Mrs. Stereotypical Witch and Mr. Psycho Civil War disappeared instantly.

"That's how," he said, surprised that it worked.

They ran out into the Impala, in case the witches came back. Balthazar tried to think of the name of the dude while he drove to the library, and Gabriel fumbled around, looking for their police or FBI badges in case they needed to flash them to get anything at the library.

They pulled up and Balthazar burst out immediately after grabbing his FBI badge. Cas grabbed his too.

"I guess I'll stay back," Gabriel said. It would be pushing it to try to get people to believe that he was old enough to be part of the FBI. Hell, it was pushing it to get people to believe that he and Balthazar were, especially Balthazar. Cas nodded, in too much of a hurry to say much else. He suddenly wanted to get to Bobby's badly, as his brother had been before they started the case. He wanted the case over with.

Sam popped in, as he did from time to time throughout their two days there since Adam was too weak to fly too much, was preserving his power.

"Nice of you to show up," he muttered as he walked into the library. Sam followed. "Stay back, in case I need to use my badge. You don't have one."

Sam pulled one up out of his pocket with a smug look on his face. "I thought it might be useful, if I'm to help you on cases here and there," he said. They hadn't asked him to do that, but Cas was sure as hell not going to turn him down.

"Okay," he said. "Then follow me. And don't act like an archangel."

He went into the library and found Balthazar. He was sifting through records quickly, eyeing them all with narrowed eyes and a stern concentration. "Yes!" he said, a bit too loud, and a couple people glared at him. "Sorry. Uh. Found it." He pulled the old file out and waved it at Cas and Sam, grinning. "C'mon, they're buried in the cemetery here."

"Looks like you were right about them being buried here," he said to Sam, rushing out of the library. If he knew the trip was going to be that quick, he would've just stayed in the car. But thank fuck for Balthazar's crazy ass smartness, because he was sure it would've taken a lot longer if it was him or Gabriel that was trying to find the graves of these people. They wouldn't have recognized the guy in the first place.

Instead of driving to the cemetery, Sam flew them out there before they even left the library. He practically conjured salt, gas, and a lighter out of his ass and handed them over to Cas and Balthazar, and Balthazar led them out to the graves quickly. Cas was only half-surprised to find that Sam had already magically emptied out all the dirt atop the graves for them.

They jumped down, opened up the coffins, and pulled each other back out of each grave. The bodies were salted, burned, and they were back in the Impala with Gabriel and Sam in the backseat and Balthazar and Cas up in the front just like that.

"Oh," Gabriel said, jumping a little when they popped into the car. "Did you find out who they were?"

"The case is over, I think," Cas said, frowning slightly back at Sam. "Are you going to put out the fires?"

"Yes. No more detours on the way to Bobby's, though. Get there as soon as possible," he said, before disappearing.

Cas let out a breath and started the Impala, driving out of the parking lot of the library. They had just salted and burned the bodies in broad daylight, which felt like the biggest thing to him out of everything as he tried to push down the other thoughts that constantly swirled around in his head anymore. After a moment, he sighed, turning the music on in the car and drowning out everything else.


	21. Chapter 21

**So this is relatively early considering I usually update every two weeks. It was going to take longer because this is a really long chapter but I cut it in half which I didn't want to do, but it was _really_ long. So here this is. I really like this chapter so I hope everyone else does too**

* * *

_After a moment, he sighed, turning the music on in the car and drowning out everything else._

…

Cas woke up when a strip of sunlight found its way over his eyelids. It was impossible to ignore the light there, so he turned over, eyes still shut, trying to get away from the light. Something was wrong. He wasn't in the right bed. He wondered if he went home with someone the night before. He must've, because this was not his bed at Bobby's and there was a warm body nearby, a man's. Huh. He hadn't gone home with a guy for a while. He didn't dwell on it, trying to drift back to sleep.

The man next to him was waking up, though, so he reluctantly opened his eyes. As soon as he did, he nearly jumped straight out of the bed, eyes wide. "_Dean?_"

There, in front of him, was Dean, seeming to be frustrated by Cas's sudden jump. He was shirtless, but as he swung his legs over the side of the bed, the blanket slid down and revealed that he was wearing pajama bottoms. Cas realized then that he wasn't shirtless but only had underwear on. He stepped out of bed, fully alert and awake despite being tired just a moment ago. This wouldn't be as freaky as it was if it weren't for the fact that Dean had gone off to not return for a long time recently and the fact that Dean was an angel and didn't require sleep.

"What's going on, Cas?" he got out, voice deep and rough from being asleep, and, Cas admitted, really hot. "Why're you so jumpy?"

"Because… you're not… What's going on? I don't know if this is some dream or if I was _really_ drunk last night or what," he said. He could feel that his eyes were still wide.

Dean looked back at him, wiping at his eyes, a little more awake than before. "What? Last night? You weren't drunk last night, and I promise this isn't a dream." He stood up. "Are you okay?"

"I think I'm forgetting something," he said after a second, stepping away from Dean. He looked _older_. His face and eyes were aged, still obviously Dean but also obviously older. He looked to be in his late thirties or something probably, and Cas distinctly remembered that Dean's vessel was in his mid twenties.

Dean cocked his head slightly, and despite being apparently human, he seemed to retain some of his angelic quirks. "What's the last thing you remember?"

"Uh, we were at Bobby's, just after Meg died or something and I went out to a bar," he said. "And now I'm here."

Dean's eyebrows were raised, which Cas took to be _not a good sign._ "Meg? Cas, you didn't even _know_ Bobby when Meg died."

"What?" he said, frowning and stepping further away. He saw his phone on the nightstand beside the bed. Grabbing it, he rushed for the door out of the room, leaving Dean standing behind, confused and stuck in that spot.

He searched through the contacts three times before he came to the conclusion that Gabriel and Balthazar weren't in there. Bobby was, though, so he searched for the laundry room to put some pants on and then the keys to the Impala once he'd done that. There were shoes at the door, and Bobby hadn't picked up even though Cas had called twice. He slipped the shoes on and went out to the Impala, getting a few blocks away before pulling over and trying to call Bobby again. He was too worried about what the hell was going on to focus on driving and calling Bobby at the same time.

"Castiel?" Bobby said, after finally answering. "What's going on? Is something wrong with Dean?"

"Um, no, Dean's fine," he said. "I just… don't remember something, I think. And Dean was saying weird things, and I can't find Balthazar or Gabriel in my contacts and I don't know why."

There was a pause, and then finally he said, "Why would they be in your contacts?"

"Why wouldn't they be? They're my brothers," he said, getting more worried and upset.

"Uh, yeah, I guess, but they died a long time ago," Bobby said, fed up with whatever Cas was rambling on about, but Cas was terrified now.

"What? But—how? How did they die?" he asked frantically.

There was another pause, and then finally Bobby said warily, "Lucifer stabbed Gabriel and you stabbed Balthazar. Are you sure you're okay, Cas? Maybe you should just stay with Dean and see if your memories come back. It might be your grace acting up again."

"But—they—I…" He tried to process that for a second, but then the final part of what Bobby said caught up to him. "My… what?"

"Your grace," he said. "Remember? You lost it and it's been making weird things happen. Listen, kid, I really don't think I can help you. Talk to Dean, okay?"

After a second, he said quietly, "Okay," and hung up.

He stared forward for a second, and then his phone started ringing. He looked down and saw Dean's name, so he answered it. This phone was weird and way more advanced than the one he was accustomed to, but he could manage it well enough. The little icons at the bottom were pretty self-explanatory.

"Dean," he said quietly, "something's wrong, and you're going to think I'm crazy because whatever's wrong is wrong with you too. Bobby said I had grace but I've never been an angel, _you_ were an angel, and that I killed Balthy and Lucifer killed Gabe and I—I don't remember _any_ of that, and I don't know why I don't, but I remember they were my brothers and we hunted in the Impala because my dad died and my mom left us to hunt and you were an angel and I liked you a lot but you left so you didn't fall. That's what I remember."

Dean was quiet for his whole speech, and when he was finally sure that Cas was done talking, he said slowly, "It's your grace. This happened before, but I snapped you out of it quickly. You imagined up a different life and you forgot your real one for a second, but I guess this is lasting longer than before. Come home and we can see if your memories come back."

"Okay," he said, his voice small. He hung up quickly and looked up into the mirror at himself. He looked just as old as Dean did, not twenty-three anymore. He drove back until he saw a house with Dean standing out on the porch, waiting for him. He pulled up and went over to him, and allowed himself to be led inside and sat down, coffee in front of him as Dean texted on his phone for a moment, saying a quick "Hang on."

Cas sipped at his coffee until Dean started to talk, and then he looked up at him. "So, uh, I can't really tell you much about before we met, because I really don't know. But you pulled me out of hell, and you were kind of a dick, but you grew on me. We stopped the apocalypse, and yeah, Lucifer killed Gabriel, but you didn't really care for him and didn't mind then. And then there was a lot with souls you were trying to… consume, or something, to kill Raphael, and you went pretty crazy and killed Balthazar. And you sort of became God. And then when you let all the souls go, there were a lot of Leviathans, and they were let free, and you died, and then came back, and you were insane, and we stopped the Leviathan, and then we ended up in Purgatory for a long time, and we came back, and Sam was doing the trials and Naomi was brainwashing you and then you lost your grace and Metatron made all the angels fall, but we helped them and I killed Abaddon and became a demon for a while but you cured me and we got rid of the Mark of Cain, which I had, and then we sort of became a thing and retired from hunting mostly."

Cas was silent, taking all of that in, sipping on his coffee as he listened. "None of that makes sense to me," he said. "I've always been human. I don't even know who Naomi, Abaddon, and Metatron are, or who the Leviathans are. And Raphael was my dad."

"Wow, this is really elaborate. There's a little bit of grace left in you, we think, and it keeps creating, trying to create more grace but just creating different things in your mind, the only thing it's strong enough to do," he said. He sighed. "Which that's about enough crazy for me, but now it's putting bullshit stories in your head that seem really believable."

Cas just shrugged slightly, not sure what to believe.

"I texted Sam," he said. "He's coming over with Elle."

"Who is Sam to you?" he asked, frowning slightly.

"My younger brother," he said patiently, seeming to be taking this in stride now. "Elle is his girlfriend. Fiancée, sorry. They just got engaged."

He nodded slightly, not really wanting to meet his version of Samuel and his fiancée. He sighed slightly and took a longer drink of his coffee.

…

Elle was very nice, as was Sam, and he and Dean seemed very happy, despite the situation. They seemed sure that everything would come back to him eventually, so after a while of trying to prod the memories back, they started to goof off and Dean offered to make hamburgers for everyone.

Sam went to the kitchen while Dean was cooking, so he was left alone with this Elle.

She seemed actually perfect for Balthazar. She was very sweet and polite to him, but as he could tell from her banter with Dean, she was also very independent and strong-willed, though not a hunter. This Sam seemed a lot like Balthazar, so he figured she was perfect for him too.

"You don't remember any of this?" she asked, managing to be sympathetic and not at the same time.

He shook his head and looked down at his lap. He'd been quiet since that morning, figuring when he woke up again, he'd be back in his regular life. This had to be a fucked up dream. If he woke up in this place the next morning, he would start to believe their story about his "grace" conjuring up the life he remembered.

"Well, I'm sure it will come back to you soon," she said. "Do you remember Dean at all?"

He nodded. "Not like he is, though."

"Oh," she said. After a second, she continued, frowning. "Well, at least you remember him at all. He'd probably be devastated if you didn't. He loves you a lot. I don't know what he'd do without you." Her frown morphed into a pretty smile, her eyes bright and sweet. "Honestly, if he actually felt it was worth anything, he'd probably marry you. As it is, the two of you may as well already be married."

He nodded slightly. If he was stuck in this life, being practically married to Dean would be nice. If it weren't for the fact that Gabriel and Balthazar were dead, and apparently douche bag angels when they were alive, he wouldn't mind staying in this place at all. Their death ruined the whole thing though.

They ate hamburgers, and he listened to Sam, Elle, and Dean talk. Nothing came back to him. But when he went to bed, he stayed close to Dean, even if it wasn't his Dean.

…

This went on for a week, and still he remembered nothing of his old life, but he was forced to adjust to it and try to ignore the stabs of pain he got when he forgot and was forced to remember that his little brothers were dead.

Dean was there for him every time he forgot, holding him, hugging him, shhing him. It was weird. At first, although he trusted and cared for this Dean, it wasn't the same as the one that he remembered, but over a week it became natural to be with him. Maybe he was remembering the real world that he was in. He didn't care, though. It was nice to find some kind of rhythm.

It was maybe two weeks after he first remembered waking up there when Elle and Sam came over—although they came over often, but this was obviously some kind of special occasion. Dean cooked hamburgers again, which everyone enjoyed. He was actually a really good cook, Cas had learned. He would have to see if the Dean in his world liked to— He startled himself out of his imaginary life with Dean the Angel. This was the real world, with Dean the Human, who was awesome and he loved him a lot.

After they ate, they went out to the porch. Dean offered him a beer, which he graciously took and sipped out while staring out over the empty country road. There were no streetlights so the world was illuminated by the moon and the stars alone that night, giving off a silvery glow that made everything at least twice as beautiful as it seemed before. The light hit Dean just so, and his face was perfect.

Dean was talking about his car—their car, because although the memories were real, Cas distinctly remembered it being his and was fiercely protective of his part-ownership of it—and Cas joined in here or there. He was sure Sam and Elle weren't actually listening, just sharing idle looks as they all but cuddled on the porch swing that Cas was reluctant to admit was really cute. Their whole house—their whole _life_—was really, really cute.

After seeming to become bored of their conversations about the Impala in the background, Cas caught Elle giving Sam a look that might've been the "it's time to go" look. They lived just down the road a bit, closer to town but only a couple minutes' drive from them. Dean and Sam were inseparable, but it made things easier. Usually they stayed a lot later than this, drinking and watching sports—per Elle's request, since Dean, Sam, and Cas had never kept up with sports but enjoyed trying to keep up with Elle's love for them.

It was these kinds of things that Cas loved and wished he remembered about the real world. He wished he could discard the memories of the false grace memories and stop hurting because of the loss of his closeness with Bobby and the loss of Balthazar and Gabriel in general.

"So," Elle said, a smile spread across her whole face, not exactly what she usually did when they left. He realized then that she didn't have a beer and wondered if she'd already finished and what she'd done with the bottle. "We have some pretty exciting news." She paused for a moment, for what felt like the purpose of adding a dramatic pause alone.

She and Sam shared a look before he said, "She's pregnant. That's the news, but she insisted on making it a thing."

"It is a thing!" she said, smiling at him.

He grinned at her and kissed her cheek. "We're not 'things' people."

Dean rolled his eyes and went in to hug them both, and said a happy "Congratulations!"

Cas hugged them both, too, smiling and congratulating. They left soon after, glued to each other, fingers laced as they held hands. Dean and Cas went upstairs, and, the whole house to themselves again, they found themselves kissing.

Dean's arms slipped around him and Cas snaked his around him too so they were entwined, pressed together, until they were tired and the kisses turned sleepier and Cas's eyes were drooping as he laughed about Dean poking his nose and saying "Boop" like a fucking five-year-old. They drifted off close together like that, warm with their body heat radiating together.

…

The wedding came and went, and Elle and Sam were incredibly happy throughout it. It was a beautiful outdoor wedding, and their love was so freaking obvious and sweet that it would give a person a toothache.

After it went, Dean and Cas found themselves without the company of Elle and Sam over often as much to watch sports and hang out. It wasn't a big deal; they both knew the newlyweds would want to enjoy their time together while the term "newlyweds" still applied to them. They had a lot of sex over this time period, which was great for both of them, and made them forget entirely about sports with Sam and Elle for those times.

Dean and Cas were baking a pie together one day, about a month after the wedding. It was pecan pie, of course, both of their favorite's. Dean had copious amounts of Hershey's kisses after he'd sneaked them into the cart at the store when Cas wasn't looking. He popped them into his mouth and into Cas's, smiling at him every time and giving him a kiss on the cheek—"a kiss with a kiss" was Dean's cheesy explanation, and then both of them groaned at it and ended up making out until they realized they had a pie to deal with.

They ate the pie with leftover spaghetti and garlic bread. It was a good night.

…

Diana Winchester was born on September 20, 2017. Dean was so flattered that they named her after him—which Sam confirmed, because yes, where else would Diana have come from?—and Cas was so happy when he first got to see her. She was tiny and wailing but magnificent and he could see hope and potential radiating from her as if he was seeing straight down to her soul, and for the first time, he realized, he felt like an angel, like he had supposedly really been.

He waited to tell Dean about it because this was family time, this was Winchester time. He realized that he was the only non-Winchester in the room. It didn't really matter, because he felt like one anyway, but he decided it'd be nice if they were the Winchesters. He was still attached to Novak, but since he knew that that name wasn't real, he had never actually been Castiel Novak—however, his vessel had been Jimmy Novak—he was more okay with discarding it for Winchester, a last name with meaning to him.

Diana was so tiny that it wasn't hard to forget about his tiny revelation for the time being. Her tininess alone distracted him enough, but her existence caught him totally off guard, in a way. Maybe that wasn't the right way to put it, he decided, but—wow. She was going to be _so loved_, and Sam and Elle were going to leave their impact on the world in this little baby's hands.

He focused again when Dean had to give the tiny baby back over to Sam, who handed her to the doctors. They had things to do with the baby and Elle. Cas wasn't sure if Elle convinced Sam to get something to eat or if he stayed with her or what, but he and Dean went home.

"Call us as soon as the two of you are home," Cas told them.

Dean nodded in agreement. "I want to come over and see the baby."

Sam grinned at him and told them he would, so they left and went back home.

"She's so cute," Dean kept saying on the car ride home.

"She is," Cas agreed, smiling over at him as Dean drove them home. He was so happy that it would've been infectious to him were he not just as happy. He was so handsome when he was this happy, though. The smile lit up his face. The sun was hitting him just right so his eyes looked golden, and it seemed like the sun was shining just to put a spotlight on him. It was sunrise and he could see it between the trees as they headed to their house in the middle of nowhere in Oregon.

"So, hey," he said when they were home, sitting next to Dean on their bed. They were both tired and happy for a chance for a nap. Dean leaned into him, heat radiating off of him.

"Hey," Dean whispered against his ear as he kissed it and his temple and cheek and forehead and nose and the corner of his lips. Cas smiled, turning so he was looking at him and his beautiful eyes and face.

"I think I might be remembering being an angel," he told him.

Dean's eyes lit up even more. "Really?" he asked. "What do you remember?"

"Nothing specifically, but I was just looking at Diana, and… I don't know. I felt… different. Bigger. Like, otherworldly or something. But it faded and I still felt crazy happy and stuff that Diana was there," he clarified, because he knew Dean might think it was just the joy over Diana's birth. "It was like… I don't know. Like I was seeing her soul without seeing it. Like I was… _angelic._ And understanding her whole existence. It was weird. I don't know how to describe it other than that."

"That's the kind of stuff you'd do as an angel," Dean told him, crawling under the blankets. Cas quickly followed suit and the warmth tripled. He moved closer Dean. He was so comfy and toasty he was surprised he was still awake.

"Maybe I'll remember soon." He yawned slightly and shut his eyes, just feeling and hearing Dean, now, and smelling his familiar scent.

"Hopefully you will," he said, rubbing his back lightly and making it even harder to stay awake. So he didn't anymore.

…

They talked frequently about having kids after that. They babysat Diana often, and the matter first seriously come up when Dean was holding her and she was screaming her head off as Cas scrambled to get diapers and Dean was _shhing_ her and singing, "_There's a lady who's sure all that glitters is gold…_ Shhh, Di… _And she's buying a stairway to heaven…_"

After they managed to change her diaper and feed her, Dean cradled her in his arms as they sat on the couch and turned _Dr. Sexy_ back on.

"I want one of these," Dean said after a second, looking over at Cas. He wasn't paying attention to the show playing on Netflix anymore. He was looking between Cas and Diana, and his eyes were so genuine that Cas felt a smile creep to his face.

"Okay."

And that was that.

…

They talked about it again a week later, when neither of them could ignore the temptation to acknowledge what they agreed on but wouldn't speak about again since anymore.

"So, we're thinking about adopting, right?" Cas said as he fried bacon for them for breakfast.

"Well, I'm not planning on finding some creepy gender-switching spell or anything so we can actually conceive, so yeah, let's adopt," he said.

Cas looked back at him and rolled his eyes. "I'm going to throw something at you."

"No, you're not," Dean said, smiling at him as he sipped at his coffee. "So we'd probably need jobs."

Cas nodded. "We need jobs anyway. We can't live illegally like this if we want to stay here forever," he said.

He nodded in agreement and went into thought, probably about what job he'd choose if he had to have one. Sam had a job. He'd been going back to college for his law degree. They needed jobs to be parents, and they really wanted to be parents.

…

Dean wanted to be a mechanic. Cas liked cars kind of, but not like Dean did. Cas liked working on and admiring their car, but Dean really liked working on cars. He was good at it and it relaxed him. So as soon as he decided this was what he wanted to do, he had to face the fact that he needed to finish high school and needed postsecondary training to be qualified enough. He knew how to work on cars, but no one was going to hire the shady new gay guy that no one saw around town much and dropped out of high school. There was too much against him for anyone to consider that.

Cas didn't know what he wanted to do until Dean suggested that he teach.

"What would I even teach?" he said, smiling at him as he sifted through their bills.

"Anything. You're a pretty smart guy," he said.

Cas rolled his eyes. "Yeah, right. You forget that I don't remember being an all-knowing angel. I just remember being an idiot. I didn't finish high school, either."

"So what?" he said, going over to him from where he was getting done putting all their dishes in the dishwasher. He sat down next to him and took his hand. Cas looked at his face and decided to listen to whatever he had to say. "We aren't stupid just because we didn't finish school—or, uh, don't remember it or whatever. You're smart, and hell, I'm smart too, even if I usually don't believe it very much. I mean, I'm nowhere near as smart as Sammy or Elle, but you are, even without your angelic memories."

He shook his head slightly and looked down.

"Fine, if you don't teach, why don't you write?" he asked, poking his chest slightly and making him smile and roll his eyes. "You're a good writer, Cas. I know you write little short stories on the laptop."

"That's just when I'm bored or something," he said, shrugging.

"So? I've read them," he said, and Cas had had no idea that Dean had actually _found them_ and _read them_. He blushed and looked away more. "They're _good_, and I'm being serious. You can write about Gabriel and Balthazar and stuff."

Cas didn't take Dean up on that, so he turned the attention to their electricity bill, which was higher than normal since they started to run the space heater in their room. It got really chilly in there.

…

Dean absolutely hated taking classes. "I fucking _know_ how to work on cars," he'd mutter, but he did it on his laptop so it wasn't like he actually had to leave the house and take them in person.

Cas got his own laptop eventually since he was actually starting to consider pursuing writing and wanted to practice more and Dean was on his laptop a lot for school.

Sam and Elle were both busy a lot with Diana, and they were busy building lives, so the nights where they sat and watches sports and ate burgers and drank beer were all but over. That wasn't to say that the four of them didn't do things much anymore because they did. They went out to eat and they sat and talked whenever they came to pick up Diana before or after babysitting. Sam, Dean, and Cas even went on a hunt one weekend, a few cities away. It was a run-of-the-mill ghost, but it was nice.

When they came back and dropped Sam back off at his house—"No, we are _not_talking your car, Sam; we're taking the Impala"—Elle was waiting on the porch, Diana sleeping in her arms. They had planned to go straight home but of course they got out and went over to the two of them, cooing over the baby who woke up and blinked at them sleepily. The four of them all made various _aww_ing noises and Cas and Dean were invited inside.

Elle had been cooking lunch for her and Sam but she said they'd have enough for all of them. Dean went into the kitchen to help her with that. He was definitely better at cooking than Cas was.

Sam and Cas were left in the living room to watch Diana and talk alone.

"Aww, I missed you, Diana," Sam said, cradling his daughter close and smiling. His long, shaggy hair was hanging down over his face as he watched the little baby and Cas, grinning ear to ear, thought about the fact that he and Dean were going to get one of those. They were going to have a little baby. He was so excited he didn't even know what to do.

When they went home, they started to deal with all the things that needed to happen in order to adopt. This was serious. This was happening. Dean and Cas couldn't be more happy.

…

They were just waiting until the baby was born. They didn't really know much about the mother that was giving the baby to them but they were supposed to meet her soon. They'd all talked on the phone a couple times before she and the agency chose them to receive the baby. That was one of the best phone calls Cas had ever had.

When the mother drove up to see them, Cas and Dean set to work cleaning the house, having some weird desire to impress this lady. They usually didn't care, but this was the biological mother of their child. It was a pretty big deal.

Her name was Talia and she was very nice. She wasn't in the right place to have a baby, no money and a bad job and the dad didn't stick around, something like that. But she really was sweet and seemed smart enough. She just got dealt the wrong cards in life. Cas wished he could help more and decided to ask Dean if there was any way they could.

She drove back home the next day, but she made sure to tell them she loved their pie.

…

Talia had been four months pregnant at that time. Two months came and went. Diana was now six months old, still so small but sitting up on her own and smiling and babbling and laughing her sweet baby laugh. She was also teething, which sucked, but she was such a cute, smart little baby. Dean and Cas loved her more every time they saw her.

Sam and Elle were so freaking happy, too. They weren't newlyweds anymore but they were so adorable it was hard to stand. Little had changed from the day they announced Elle was pregnant, cuddled up on Cas and Dean's cute little porch swing.

That was where they were while they were babysitting, Diana in Dean's arms and Cas with his head on his boyfriend's shoulder.

"I love you," he said idly, because he did, and sometimes he just thought of it at times, just remembered that he could hold Dean's hands and count all the freckles and decide exactly what to call the shade of Dean's eyes or hair. He could listen to the rumble of his voice and hold or be held. He could fuck or be fucked into oblivion and that was all his. That was his life. He was _so_ happy, and it was all because of Dean, all because of their life. He loved him so freaking much.

"I love you too," he said quietly, and that was that, as many things were between the two of them. They had said they loved each other before, obviously, but each time it was like a new agreement. Each time they found something new they loved about each other and were telling each other about that, not about the love as a whole. That, Cas had decided once, was too big to be expressed in words so short as "I love you," even if those three words, when put together, were very powerful, strong, beautiful words. They weren't enough, though, not when describing how much _Cas loved Dean_ and _Dean loved Cas._

…

Their baby was born June 17, 2018. They named him Thomas. He was smaller than Diana. He didn't look anything like either of them. Talia was Hispanic with very light, entrancingly gray eyes. Thomas's were just a dull gray, but babies' eyes didn't always stay the same when they got older.

It was so surreal, to hold his son in his arms. He would deny adamantly later that he got teary, but he definitely did. He stroked his son's little head and passed him from Dean, who admired him for a long time before handing the baby down to Talia, who, with tears in her eyes, said, "Oh, gosh. He's so small."

He was. He was tiny. He wasn't _too_ tiny or anything. Maybe it was just the fact that this was his son. This was a Winchester, his Winchester, his little guy to raise and love for the rest of his life. Maybe that was what made him seem so tiny. Whatever it was, he loved him so much.

Talia and Thomas were checked in various ways by the hospital. Cas wanted to hold him again the whole time he was away. He and Dean went out in the waiting room to talk to Sam and Elle. Diana wasn't with them. Sam and Elle were close to their neighbors, the Whitmans, who were honestly the nicest old people ever but also seemed too good to be true to Cas. They probably left Diana with them.

When they got to see Thomas again, Sam and Elle came to see him too and smiled and _aww_ed and took turns holding him.

"He's smaller than Diana was, isn't he?" Sam asked, so fatherly in that one sentence. Cas didn't know why, but just—that one sentence, not particularly fatherly but fatherly enough to Cas, made all of this seem real. He didn't know why, and he was sure later that would all make him feel panicked. But for now, he had a _son_, and he was holding him now as Elle passed him off to him, and he smiled from ear to ear, looking to Dean. Beautiful, enchanting, aging Dean, with his gray hair that was coming up more and more often, and wrinkles that littered his face and crinkled his smile. Dean, his boyfriend, Thomas's dad just as Cas was his dad.

"He's such a cute little baby," Elle said, but Cas was pretty sure she was the type to think all babies were cute. She was a kindergarten teacher after all.

"He is," Sam agreed, and Dean beamed proudly.

Dean wrapped an arm around Cas's shoulder, peering down at the tiny little soul cradled in his arms. Cas's eyes filled again happily and he smiled, cleared his throat. "God," he whispered quietly, feeling so level with everything, feeling—angelic, like before, when Diana was born.

"Yeah," Dean breathed, the word tickling his ear. "Hey, what's his middle name gonna be?"


	22. Chapter 22

**Holy crap look at me updating so early. I just love this chapter. Don't worry, though, if you are. The story isn't even close to an end, and whatever you think about what's been going on this chapter and the last chapter and the next chapter after this one, you're probably wrong. But anyway, everything will be revealed in more detail than a vague "Cas's grace did a weird false memory thing" next chapter.**

* * *

_"Hey, what's his middle name gonna be?"_

…

His middle name was Cole.

…

Things changed a lot when Thomas was born. Cas watched him while Dean took his classes—he was getting ready to finish with them, actually—and Dean watched him while Cas wrote. The rest of the time was shared between the two of them, and they were always somewhere in the spectrum of exhausted, aggravated, and groaning 24/7 about whose turn it was to change Thomas's diaper or feed him and overjoyed, ecstatic, watching him and saying how they couldn't wait until he was old enough to laugh and smile and babble and interact like Diana.

"They're only six months apart," Dean said quietly, so as not to wake the baby that had just fallen asleep in the crib.

Cas nodded. "Maybe they'll be friends," he said. He hoped they would. Friends were always good. He thought Thomas and Diana would be good friends. He didn't really know why, he just thought that they would be.

About two weeks after Thomas was born, Elle and Sam came over for dinner. It was the first time since before Thomas was born, although before that, they had been doing it again frequently. They had settled into a rhythm with Diana. Cas figured things would slow before they found that rhythm to balance between other people, careers, and children. They hadn't thought about hunting in a long time.

Diana was shrieking and laughing in a way that she only did when Sam was making this one really horribly ugly face at her. Cas smiled a little bit as he helped Dean make pie as Elle cooked the chicken for the chicken parmesan. They were at their house. It was very clean and smelled weird, different from the Winchester smell. He realized that their house, Dean and Cas's, didn't have the Winchester smell anymore, either, and neither did the Impala. They had all adopted their own smells—domestic smells. Domesticity was very strong and contagious to everything it touched.

When the pie was done, he left Dean to do the final touches. It was apple pie and it smelled freaking _delicious._ He went into the living room where Sam was tickling Thomas. "C'mon, Tommy, laugh for Uncle Sammy," he said. Cas smiled and rolled his eyes slightly. Sam saw and grinned. "Shut up."

Cas knelt down in front of Thomas. "I like the nickname Tommy, don't you, Thomas?"

He could swear the baby's eyes lit up when he heard Cas's voice and he made a little sound, some kind of recognition or baby happiness or something. It was cute and it made Cas grin.

"They're so sweet when they're that young, aren't they?" Sam said, looking at Diana and letting her hold his finger, wrapping her itty bitty fingers only partially around his one giant thumb.

"They're so sweet always," Cas said, looking over at him, "unless they're crying."

Sam smiled and nodded in agreement. "You'll be a really great dad, you know. Tommy is pretty lucky to have you and Dean."

"Diana's pretty lucky to have you and Elle," Cas replied sincerely.

He smiled wider. "We all make pretty good pairs, don't we?" Sam said.

"Sam, come help me," Elle called. Sam nudged him and got up, going to the kitchen to help his wife. Dean came in a second later and immediately grinned at Tommy and then tickled Diana. She giggled her loud, baby laugh.

"Hey, tinies," Dean said. Upon hearing his voice, Tommy made another little noise. "Hey, my special little tiny." Dean leaned down and kissed the top of Tommy's head.

Cas grinned at him, kissing his cheek.

"Hey, dinner's ready," Sam said, coming in there.

They moved the babies into the dining room and ate the really, really freaking good chicken parmesan with pie for desert. Halfway through Cas's second piece of pie—fuck, it was good pie—Elle bit her lip and gave Sam a look Cas found oddly familiar.

He knew as soon as she said it that that was the face she'd just given Sam. "I'm pregnant," Elle announced. That had definitely been the _When should I tell them I'm pregnant?_ face Elle was wearing.

Reverence for their pie forgotten, Dean and Cas sprang to life, congratulating and grinning at the couple. Elle was thirty-two and Sam thirty-five, so they were past being a _young_ couple, not quite the traditional ages for just having had their first child and soon having their second, but Dean was thirty-nine and he was thirty-six, as far as he remembered, anyway, so they weren't exactly all that young to be having Thomas.

Still, they seemed young, all four of them did, lively and excited by this recent turn of events. Another Winchester was definitely news; after all, Sam and Dean had thought the bloodline would die out with them, but now they had little Diana and the baby coming up. Thomas wasn't really in the bloodline, but he was definitely a Winchester, Cas's own special baby Winchester.

He started crying so Cas waved Dean off and let him celebrate while he went to go soothe the crying baby. He looked down into the small, upset face of the boy and nearly felt tears coming into his eyes. He was just overwhelmed by their life, the perfection of it. It was everything that he might ever want.

…

Dean got a job in town not long after Elle announced she was pregnant. They still had money from fake credit cards, a lot stored up for them to last a few months. Cas got serious about writing. He thought about what he wanted to write, what kind of story he would like to tell. He knew it would be about Balthazar and Gabriel, but he didn't know how. Chuck Shurley already wrote about Dean and Sam and their supernatural adventures. If he were to write about Gabriel, it would sound almost the same with different names.

So, instead, he writes Balthazar into the role of a star and Gabriel into the role of a comet.

"Why?" Dean asked once, playing with his hair in bed, Tommy in between them, sleeping.

"Because," Cas explains quietly, realizing he had never shared much with Dean about his false grace memories that he was so attached to. "Balthazar was bright and—amazing. Gabriel was fleeting but if you got to see him, you'd never forget it."

"So that doesn't answer my question," he said. "How are you going to write a story?"

That wasn't really a problem. Balthazar was a star transformed, and Gabriel was a comet changed. It was a cool, magical universe, and Cas was actually pretty proud of inventing it up, conjuring it into his dreams and remembering it when he woke up.

_How a Piece of Space Came Home_ was the working title. He told Dean to be obvious, but he still had to hide his disappointment when Dean said the title sounded like a children's book, too simple.

_The Journey of Starlight_was the second title, which Dean liked much more.

…

September came rolling around before they knew it, and Diana was a year old. She was so small and sweet, and it seemed like she'd stay that way forever. It seemed like Tommy would eternally be her itty bitty baby nephew and she'd be the toddling little one-year-old, but things changed, rapidly, and before anyone knew what was going on, March 4 was there and suddenly Elle was going into labor.

Clare was bigger than both Diana and Thomas were, although it wasn't super hard to beat Tommy. Cas and Dean were excited to have another niece, but also they were talking again around this time about adopting again. Two kids would be perfect for them. They were both very sibling-oriented and they didn't want Tommy to be an only child, and anyway, they loved having him. Another would be good too.

So when all the excitement from Clare settled down, they started to look into it again. Cas wrote a lot, Dean worked a lot, and they had their hands full with babysitting Diana and Clare and Tommy's various things he needed at his small baby age. He was almost a year old, though, and they were excited for that to come. They'd probably just have a dinner that night. They did things with Sam and Elle more often now, having long since found that rhythm with balancing their new, domestic lives and Tommy.

Cas was making serious progress on his novel and he made Dean read chapters from it here and there, printed them out and told Dean to make notes on _anything_ that seemed not right.

Before they knew it, Tommy was toddling, Diana was talking, and Clare was enjoying her daily doses of "Tummy time!" exclaimed in overly excited voices by both Sam and Elle every time they came over. If it wasn't so adorable how nerdy the two of them were together and how it even transferred into their baby talk, Cas was sure Dean would strangle them for tummy time alone, let alone their other annoying little habits.

Cas remembered tummy time with Tommy. They just called it "Should we do the tummy thing now?" (Although, secretly, they both called it Tommy's Tummy Time and laughed about it like the idiots they were.)

It was around this time they applied for another child and were chosen by someone. The due date for their next child was in August. They were going to meet with the mother sometime in June, although not the seventeenth since that was Tommy's first birthday. It was coming up rapidly.

…

It went successfully, and before they knew it, they were meeting Analise Will, the mother of their daughter. Analise was nice, just as Talia was. She didn't say much about her situation other than it wasn't a good one for a baby to be but she didn't want to abort—she said maybe if it was worse, she'd consider it, though—so she was going through with adoption.

"You guys seemed awesome," she explained when Dean asked why she picked them. "I mean, you seem really—chill, I guess. Plus, you've adopted before, so I know someone else thinks you're good candidates."

"Yeah," Cas said, smiling. He looked behind him at Tommy. He was playing with his toys over in the living room and he could see him through the arch leading from there into the kitchen, where they were. Analise looked back at him too.

"And he seems so happy," she said. "His name is Thomas?"

"Yeah, but we just call him Tommy," Dean said, smiling proudly at the compliments they were receiving about their parenting. Dean was always proud to have turned out to be a pretty decent dad. "He's such a good kid. I never saw myself having kids before, and especially after Cas and I got together, I just didn't think it was going to happen. But adopting Tommy was just—the best decision I've ever made—we've ever made."

Analise smiled. "I hope one day I'm in a better place and I can keep a baby," she said, looking down at her pregnant stomach. "I just—" She cut herself off, shaking her head. "I don't feel like explaining it, but… Well, I'm so happy you're happy to adopt. I want this baby in good hands."

…

Her name was Marie Elizabeth Winchester, born on August 26, 2019.

…

Marie and Tommy got along really well, which was a miracle and a blessing mixed together for Dean and Cas, as they'd expected some immediate sibling rivalry between the newborn and the one-year-old, for some reason. Tommy maybe wasn't coping all that greatly with the attention being taken from 100% solely on him to 100% shared on him, but he would have to get used to it. He'd learn to love Marie, they knew.

Sam and Elle were looking to move to Massachusetts. Elle wanted to leave Oregon for good and Sam would follow that woman if she went to the end of the Earth. Even with a family and a life, though, Dean would follow Sammy to the end of the Earth too, so they made arrangements to move there too.

It would happen in January.

…

They got a nice house, just down the road from Sam, on the edge of town. Cas missed the quiet emptiness surrounding their house in Oregon, but they had a huge porch in the front and back of the house, an _enormous_ backyard, and a nice fence. It was good. He would more than make do. He would fall in love with the house.

…

Which he did.

…

When Tommy turned three, he asked, _Why don't I have a mommy?_ He wouldn't accept the answer of, _You have two daddies. You can have two daddies and no mommy._

Marie was equally confused, but she was younger, so they didn't really try very hard to explain the concept to her yet. She got distracted by her toys on the floor anyway.

…

Diana and Dean loved to sing together. Her favorite song was Stairway to Heaven, and Cas knew that that made Dean really happy. They sang everything, though, from Twinkle Twinkle Little Star to AC/DC to Taylor Swift. Dean tolerated Taylor Swift in the house for Diana alone. And maybe Marie when she got older. And Clare. And Tommy, if that was what he liked. Okay, he allowed Taylor Swift in the house.

…

Dean and Cas were having an alone night once when Tommy was barely over three and Marie almost two, going out to a nice place to eat. They talked about everything—life, the old hunting days, their kids, their nieces, Sam and Elle. It was an awesome night, and Sam texted Dean a picture in the middle of their entrée of Clare, Diana, Tommy, and Marie all playing and laughing. Cas had never seen smiles as big on their tiny little faces, and he was pretty sure he fell twice as in love with the children as before, a feat he'd thought impossible at that point.

They got dessert, pie for Dean and chocolate cake for Cas. Dean got half the cake, though, and Cas got half the pie, and they both decided that while both things were _amazing, _Elle made better chocolate cake and they made better pecan pie. They were glad they'd had it though, because it really was pretty good.

They went after that to watch a movie, something they usually weren't interested in, but it was really fun. Cas really got into it, although Dean was whispering in his ear every five minutes, "What a douche." "Fuck, I bet he dies." "Well that was fucking badass."

The couple with their seven-year-old son in front of them glared every time and Cas tried so hard to stifle a laugh, but when Dean snapped, "Goddamn it, that fucker couldn't look to the left—if she would've looked to the fucking left, she'd be alive!" they gave him such an evil, angry glare that Cas burst out into laughs and his face turned red from embarrassment as the parents looked at him, horrified, but he just ignored it and moved closer to Dean, kissing his cheek. "I love you," he whispered, and that seemed to dismay the apparently homophobic parents more than anything. He was pretty glad he could annoy them, actually.

He was sure they would be _horrified_ to learn of what they did _after_ the movies that night.

…

Diana was diagnosed with stage three childhood rhabdomyosarcoma when they noticed that there was a little lump where her lymph nodes were. Sam and Elle were beyond crushed. Cas felt horrible for some reason, maybe because his kids were okay, but also he just felt—so defeated. After all they had been through, all they had done, they had finally found happiness, finally chosen their little reward—just to have their kids, have their lives—and for some reason it wasn't enough. They hadn't sacrificed enough for Diana to live.

Diana was too young, only _four_. It wasn't fair. What had she done to deserve this? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. She was _four years old_, and she was fucking diagnosed with _stage three_ cancer. He hated everything. He hated all his brothers and sisters, all the fucking angels he didn't even remember. He hated the dead, real Balthazar and Gabriel that were nothing like the fake ones in the memories. He hated everything to do with the world that gave little Diana Winchester cancer.

Sometimes he was angry like that, and sometimes he was just overwhelmingly sad, and all the time he was immensely scared.

She could get surgery for it. That was one of the only options.

Except there wasn't a way to do surgery on the tumor without hurting her more.

Sam called crying one night at three in the morning. Dean woke him up and he heard Sam on speaker. He sat up, rubbing at his eyes and listening to what Sam was saying, though it was hard to understand as he stuttered and cried.

"I—we don't know—we don't _know_… The tumor—it just—it- it got worse, and they can't… They can't do surgery, and—I mean, chemotherapy and radiation therapy—they have to do those things…" There was a long pause in which all Cas could hear was Sam letting out a little, sad noise that made Cas's heart ache to help him and help his niece. "She's so young. She's so fucking young."

"I'm so sorry, Sammy," Dean replied immediately, his voice fearful and sympathetic. "I hope they can get rid of it."

"I should've noticed sooner. Should've been able to tell about the lump or fucking _something_," Sam said. "Surely there were other symptoms—that time she coughed up and I thought maybe it was blood but Elle said she had just had way too much cranberry juice and was probably just throwing up. I mean, little shit like that. If we had only _noticed sooner,_ in stage one or stage two—but fucking—_stage three goddamn head and neck rhabdomyosarcoma._ What the hell? I don't even know what to do."

"Just—calm down," Dean said gently, in a way that made it so no one could get angry, even at the thought of calming down when their daughter was dying. "Take a breath. Elle and Diana need you right now. Do you want us to come to the hospital, too?"

"Please. I have Clare with me and I need someone to be here and I need you guys to watch her while I go in and talk to someone about Di," Sam said.

Dean and Cas didn't know where to take Marie and Tommy so they woke the two of them up and got them ready to go. Tommy complained and whined but in the end fell asleep on Dean's back as he carried him and Cas carried Marie on his hip, telling her the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears to keep her from crying about how tired she was. She loved stories.

"What if she—" Dean started, but they both knew what he was going to say and Cas didn't want to hear it.

"Don't," he snapped. "I don't want to ever even think of it." He wasn't angry. He just really didn't. Marie was in his lap and looked very concerned when he snapped, though. "I'm sorry," he said after a moment, quieter. "But—don't. She'll be okay."

…

That night when she was four years and two months old, she was okay.

She was okay at four and three months.

She was worse at four and four months.

It just kept going downhill, a spiral that made Cas yearn for the days when she was small and full of life, the cancer not affecting her at all. Everyone was down for a long time, and Diana all but lived at the hospital, and then suddenly, when she was four and a half, almost exactly, things just got horrible. The chemotherapy wasn't working. They were going to start radiation therapy, maybe something that sounded like fractions? He didn't know the exact terms, just that it was happening to his baby niece and it needed to work. He hated that she had to deal with all this, but it _had to work._

…

It didn't work.

…

They were visiting Diana once, when it was all but hopeless, and she was in stage four. She wasn't five years old. It wasn't even nine months since things got really bad, when she was four years and two months old. Cas was listening to Elle explain what the doctors had said recently and he heard something from Diana's room. He looked into the window and saw Dean with Marie and Clare in his lap and Tommy at his side, lips moving as he talked or—

Sang. He was singing, tears in his eyes, and Tommy and Marie and Clare were trying to sing with him, not really understanding what was going on, and Diana was awake, tiny little face so pale and sunken and so full of horrible death, but there was a bright little smile on her face.

Cas was certain they were singing Stairway to Heaven. He almost started to cry. He wasn't really paying attention to Elle anymore, but she wasn't talking, looking inside the room too. Cas went to the door and creaked it open and for sure he heard, "_And the forests will echo with laughter…_" the kids' tiny voices mixing with Dean's broken, deep one. He was sure they knew he was coming in but Diana started to form her lips around the words so Dean didn't stop. "_And it makes me wonder…_"

They continued, Cas and Elle just outside, and Dean's eyes filled even more as Cas heard him conclude the song quietly, "_And she's buying a stairway to heaven…_"

…

It was a rainy, pathetic, cold day, September 14. Six days before her birthday. She didn't last a year with her cancer. She never turned five. Diana would never see how beautiful the day was on September 20, 2022. It was sunshiny and there was a butterfly that landed outside his window. He remembered it distinctly because once, when they were outside, she pointed to one and he said, "What's that, Diana?"

And she said, "That's a Baltimore Checkerspot!" butchering the pronunciation but knowing exactly what butterfly it was. "Daddy told me so."

"Well, you're right," he said, swinging her hand a little.

He would've liked to let her hold a butterfly like that. She never would.

…

Marie, Tommy, and Clare didn't understand. They didn't know that it was Diana in the coffin that everyone was going up to look at during the visitation. They didn't know why everyone was crying. They didn't understand. They _didn't know._ They might not even remember Diana when they got older, but Cas would remember her vividly. He would remember her little brunette curls, her sweet big eyes, her brighter-than-the-sun smile. He would remember her tiny voice, so high, trying to harmonize with Dean as they sang, "_Shake it off! Shake it off!_"

He thought he'd hold it together but—then he just didn't. He thought of that, that little girl, and knew that it was absurd, horrible to think he _wouldn't cry._ Castiel cried a lot, and so did Dean, but it was nothing to how much Sam and Elle cried. It was a very, very small funeral, just them and Elle's parents who had visited Diana during the holidays.

It was closed casket. Dean still went up to it, so Dean followed, leaving Elle's parents to watch the little ones. Sam and Elle hadn't left the coffin's side. Dean touched it lightly, tears welling in his eyes as he let his cries rack through him a couple times before saying, "God. You climb that stairway, Di. You're the strongest little girl I know."

Elle's sobs tore through her like a physical injury.

It was at the procession, when Marie tugged on his hand and said quietly, "Where's Diana?" that he next fell apart.

"She's—she's not coming back, Marie, honey," he whispered shakily. "She's—she's dead." He pointed to the tombstone.

_September 20, 2017-September 14, 2022. Diana Hope Winchester. _It had a little picture of her, before the cancer, smiling and beautiful. The big hole in front of it seemed ominous and angry, ready to consume. He felt horrible about all those graves he desecrated before. What if someone in one of those graves was once just a little Diana, innocent but trapped on Earth for too long?

He felt himself crying again and he just knelt in front of Marie and tugged her into his arms, pulling her up and smoothing her hair down, tugging her black dress down a little bit. "Shh, Marie," he said, listening to Sam as he said something about Diana, something about how she fought so hard and, to him, she had never stopped being beautiful. Being perfect.

And that was true. She would forever be in their heads as that radiant little baby girl, a memory they'd treasure forever. A memory, gone but not lost.

…

_The Journey of Starlight_ was doing really well, actually, but he didn't care. Sam was doing well as a lawyer, Elle loved her class when she went back to it, Dean liked working with cars.

Tommy was six, then, and it was two years later, two years after Diana. There was emptiness for a long time, a hole that could never be filled. If Sam and Elle didn't have Clare, and he and Dean didn't have Marie and Tommy, he didn't know what he'd do. What they'd all do. Without Diana, everything was—bad. Horrible, for a long time, only okay because they had to be okay for their children.

But things looked up, as all things do. Tommy went to school, Marie and Clare went to preschool. Tommy was in Elle's class and she was he was a great student, a quick learner and really interested in math. He picked up on it better than anyone else in the class. Cas and Dean were very proud of him.

Whenever Stairway to Heaven came on the radio, though, or on Pandora, there was always tears. From Dean, especially, but from Cas, too, because he remembered the day when Dean, Tommy, Clare, and Marie were all singing it to her, and she was so happy. He was sure that was the last time he saw her that happy. Every time after that she was—well, she was dying. It was hard to be happy when there was nothing to be happy about, even as a little not-yet-five-year-old.

Because she wasn't five. No. When people asked how old she'd been, and he'd been asked a couple times, he never said five. _She wasn't._ She didn't get to turn five. They weren't given the privilege—_she_ wasn't given the privilege to see her sixth year, to see the day she turned five.

…

He wrote about a little girl named Della. He didn't know if it would ever go anywhere. If it did, he'd dedicate it to her.

…

Dean broke his arm when Tommy was still six, Clare and Marie five. Clare had just gotten in trouble in school for yelling at a kid because she said that there was no way Diana died of "Raaab-doooo-my-o-sar-commmm-uh" if Clare couldn't even say it. She didn't get in trouble. He was pretty sure that the other kid should've gotten in trouble, but the preschool teacher seemed to favor the other kid. He automatically didn't like her.

Marie got in trouble the next day for going to the girl that said that, saying, "There's no way your Mommy and Daddy got dee-var-sss-ed if you can't say it. And it's _di-vor-ced_. _My_ daddy told me."

That was what she said that she said, anyway, and the preschool teacher agreed. She got in trouble for that because, while the kid was a sucky kid, she shouldn't have done the things she did to make her mad right back to the girl. It wasn't nice of her.

Tommy excelled in math and did pretty okay in everything else. He was learning at an average pace and he always asked when he'd be old enough to read Daddy's books. That made Cas happy.

…

Dean was crying one day, a little over two and a half years later, just cradling a picture of Diana close to him and whispering about a stairway. That was the theme song of the girl's existence, it seemed.

Cas had gone in there to ask if Dean wanted anything from the store, but the store could wait. He went to Dean and sat next to him, wrapping his arms around him and holding his boyfriend close. "Love you," he said quietly, rubbing his back. "It's okay, Dean. Love you."

"Love you too," he said quietly, seeming to calm with Cas's whispering and his presence. "I just miss her, is all. It's not fair."

"If there is one thing you, Sam, Elle, and I will all always agree on, it's that it wasn't fair," he said quietly. "I understand. I know. I—fuck, I wish… I wish there was _more_ that could've been done. It was too late. It was just…"

And there he went, dissolving into tears, two years later, and all he could think about was the day she died. He had been there, and she looked _so_ tiny, so ready to just stop fighting.

She had been amazing, and the world was duller, less spectacular and beautiful, without her.


	23. Chapter 23

**So this is the end to the weird stuff, but it won't be explained what all this was about until next chapter. Also, Camp NaNoWriMo is coming up, so I'll update about two or three times throughout April since I'll be focusing more on my novel. But if you don't to just be lost on when I'm going to update throughout the month, I'll post it on Tumblr every time I do. My tumblr is casdeansam**

* * *

_She had been amazing, and the world was duller, less spectacular and beautiful, without her._

…

Three years later, Clare mentioned her older sister in the most detail since she'd been alive. Cas was babysitting Clare and watching Tommy and Marie while Dean, Sam, and Elle were all at work. Marie and Tommy were both stacking blocks and building little cities with them and then they'd have the cities destroyed by their stuffed animal. Tommy was seven then, Marie almost exactly six, having just recently turned the age. Clare was about six and a half.

She crawled into the seat beside Cas and looked up at him, almost seeming concerned for her tiny little face. "Unc-el Cas," she said, exaggerating the syllables. Diana had always just said "Unca Cas" and "Unca Dean." It was cute. He missed being Unca Cas, but being Unc-el Cas was equally as awesome.

"Clare," he greeted, wrapping an arm around her tiny little form and drawing her close, expecting something resembling a serious conversation—as serious as conversations got with six-year-olds. "What's up?"

"I don't wanna sing at school for the concert," she said.

He frowned slightly, but little kids got upset over unimportant things so he knew he just had to humor her and treat it like the most serious thing ever. And it was confusing; she had just recently been talking about how badly she wanted to sing in that concert for school. "Why not?" he asked her.

She bit her lip. "Mrs. Bell likes… um, Led Zep-lel-in," she said, and he smiled a little bit at her pronunciation but refrained himself from correcting her, knowing she had more to say about it. "We're gonna sing Stairway to Heaven and I don't wanna. It makes me sad."

Cas drew her even closer and looked down at Clare, kind of understanding where she came from. Whenever Stairway to Heaven came on the radio or anything, he didn't care much to listen to it. It made him sad, too. "Is it because of Diana?"

She nodded, little pigtail bobbing as she did so. "I don't know much about her but there was one time when me and Dean and Tommy and Marie all sang to her and that was right before she died and I miss her and I want to sing to her again. And I don't think I wanna sing that song unless it's to Diana."

"I know," he said quietly, rubbing the little girl's back comfortingly. "I know how you feel. I really miss her, too."

"I want a big sissy but it's not fair because even if Mommy and Daddy had another baby it wouldn't be Diana and _I'd_ be the big sissy. I don't want to be. I just want Diana back." She was almost crying now. It was four years later, but maybe now she was just old enough to understand what happened to her little sister more than before. Of course, she was six, so she couldn't really understand death other than Diana couldn't come back and everyone missed her, but it was better than before when she was littler and she asked where Diana was every once in a while.

"I don't think your mom and dad are going to have any more babies," he said, patting her shoulder lightly. "But you have to sing the song in school, okay? I know it makes you sad, but think about the song. You know Diana climbed that stairway to heaven, right? So maybe she can see you singing it at school and it will make her happy."

Clare seemed to like that idea. She smiled a little bit, a faint little upturn of her lips, and after a moment of thinking what he'd said over, she nodded. "Okay," she said quietly. "I want to make her happy, even if I can't see her anymore."

"I want to make her happy too," he told her, rubbing her back briefly and kissing the top of his niece's head after wiping the tears out of her eyes gently.

"You and Dean should sing her song," she said, crawling so she was in his lap and was hugging him. "I like Dean's singing."

"He's not too bad when he tries, is he?" he said, smiling at her even more. "When Dean gets home from work, you know what you should do, Clare?"

"What?" she asked, smiling, excited with something to do.

"You, Tommy, and Marie should all ask him to sing," he said. "Don't whine, but give him the puppy eyes he always gives in to and say, '_Pleeease, Uncle Deaaan._' And have Tommy and Marie say, '_Pleeease, Daddyyy._' He'll have fun singing to you again."

She giggled. "Okay! Does he come home before my mommy and daddy?"

"Yeah, he does today," he told her, patting her back. "Go tell Tommy and Marie the plan, okay?"

…

Dean really did like to sing. So he did to Tommy, Marie, and Clare again. He never complained about the fact that sometimes, they liked music like Taylor Swift more than Metallica. Taylor Swift was all but old news by then, of course, but Dean liked to refer to the girls'—and Tommy's, a majority of the time—taste in music as "Swift music."

But they did respectfully love Dean's music too. The respectfully was, of course, because Dean said, "It would just be plain _disrespectful_ to not enjoy at least a _few_ of their songs," about every one of his favorite bands.

Cas agreed, because he had fallen for Dean's music through Gabriel in his old memories he hardly thought of anymore.

He thought maybe he was dishonoring Gabriel and Balthazar's images for not thinking of the memories anymore, but they weren't _real._ It made him sad, confused, and everything in between, but when he didn't even try to push the memories away and they faded, he didn't think much of it anymore.

…

Tommy asked to bring a friend over when he was eight. He'd always talked about friends at school, had gone over to their houses, had had parties in town, but it wasn't until he was eight that Cas and Dean would host Tommy's first sleepover.

"So who do you want to come over, again?" Dean asked. They knew some of the parents from school.

"Rory and Mason," he said idly as he fished through his backpack for something.

It wasn't a rule to get their homework done right after school but they made a point of making sure it was always done before five. That way Marie and Tommy weren't likely to do it at the same time and distract or annoy each other and so they could have an hour or two to relax after school. They liked the system and so did the kids, so it stuck, and Sam and Elle adopted it for Clare too. Of course, Clare and Marie were five, so there wasn't a whole lot of homework the kindergarteners were getting.

"Rory and Mason who?" Cas asked, looking up from the notebook he was scribbling plot ideas in.

"Rory Bracken and Mason Wilkin," Tommy answered, looking up at them.

"Bracken," Dean said, frowning. "Did Rory come to your birthday party?"

Tommy nodded.

"Lily Bracken was the nice mom that helped us clean up at the park after," Cas supplied for Dean, knowing he was trying to remember who belonged to that surname. "And Jacob Bracken is the coach of Marie's soccer team."

"Right, yeah," Dean said, nodding. "I just know him by Jake."

Cas looked at him and smiled, rolling his eyes. "Yeah, you can have them over tomorrow night, Tommy," he said. "We'll order pizza and get you boys ice cream and chips."

Tommy smiled excitedly. "Thank you, Dads!" He started off toward his room quickly.

"Hey, but you have to clean your room first," Dean called, and Tommy pouted for a second but then bounded off toward his room anyway, nothing seeming to be able to break his spirit for long.

…

Marie came to them one night when she was seven and asked if they'd stay up with her for a little bit.

Cas blinked at her warily, turning on his bedside light and rubbing at his eyes. "Marie, honey, it's a school night," he said quietly, wanting to get back to sleep before he had to wake up to get them ready for school. Dean sat up and frowned slightly at Marie in the doorway, still waking up. "What are you doing up?"

"I had a nightmare," she said, entering the room more and sitting on the edge of their bed. "I don't want to go back to sleep. I just want to watch a movie." She paused for a second, and then added quickly, "And I don't want to be alone."

Dean missed work the next day. He didn't do that often. He could spare a day. Marie hadn't missed any school yet that year. They could afford both kids a few I-just-can't-go-to-school-today days here and there. So they watched movies with Marie and made her ice cream and to make up for making Tommy go despite Marie staying home, they had pizza for dinner from his favorite pizza place. It was a nice day.

…

When Clare turned nine, Sam and Elle were called to the school to have a meeting with her teacher. Cas and Dean were waiting for word of whatever was happening.

"Dad," Tommy said, coming into the kitchen while Cas warmed up leftover grilled chicken. "Oh, wrong dad. I thought you were Dean."

Cas shrugged. "What do you need?" he asked, looking over at his son.

His nose wrinkled. "We're having leftovers again?"

"Hey, you liked the grilled chicken and so did Marie," he said. "I don't want to waste it."

"Ugh," he groaned, but continued on without complaining anymore. "Can you help me with math?"

"Sure," he said. "Starting your homework a bit late, aren't you?"

"I started it earlier, I was just in my room," he said, shrugging. "I got all of it done but my math confuses me."

Cas nodded and went into the kitchen to help him.

…

"She yelled at a group of girls and called them bitches because they called her weird," Sam explained later about Clare's situation. Cas sighed, looking over at Dean.

"She told me about that," Marie said from the door, startling both of them. They hadn't noticed that she was there. She came into the room and sat on the bed. "I don't think I would've said that word but I would've been mad if they did that to me."

"Why do they think she's weird, Marie?" Dean asked, frowning slightly, obviously frustrated by his niece being picked on. Everyone was so protective of Clare, especially after Diana's death. He knew it frustrated her that they were overly cautious with her.

"She's really smart," Marie said, swaying back and forth a little bit, looking up at the ceiling. "I'm not in the same class as her or the girls that are mean to her but if they're ever mean to her at lunch I'll tell them to stop and tell a teacher because I don't think Clare wants to."

"They pick on her because she's smart?" Sam asked over the phone, the frown audible in his voice.

Marie nodded, although Sam couldn't see that. She probably wasn't thinking about it. She seemed like she was fighting going to sleep so early, at six. "She uses big words and she knows how everything works and the teacher really likes her so I think they call her a nerd and a loser. But she has a friend named Nyla that's really nice."

"Well, I didn't know all of that," Sam said. "I don't want her to be calling people bitches, but I think I'll tell Elle not to ground her if she did it because they were picking on her. And I'll talk to her teacher about it."

"Stupid girls," Dean muttered, motioning for Marie to come over to him. She did and he kissed the top of his daughter's head. "I hope no one's every mean to you, Marie."

She shook her head. "I don't think anyone is."

"Is anyone mean to Tommy?" Cas asked.

"He's in fifth grade," she said, looking over at him with slightly widened eyes. "I don't know what the fifth graders are like."

He smiled a little bit. "Well, I hope those girls don't mess with Clare anymore, Sam," he said, having promised to watch a movie with Tommy and not wanting to start it too late.

"Yeah, I do too. Are you guys still all coming over for dinner tomorrow night?" he asked.

"Yeah."

"Okay, see you then."

…

Tommy won an award for excellent leadership and academics when he was thirteen. Marie and Clare were both eleven, fifth graders, long since having forgotten about the teasing that the girls had been doing to Clare. They were in the same class, good friends as they had always been, but strengthened now that they were together all day. Nyla was their friend too, and Marie's friend Piper.

They were really as close as they could be, Marie and Clare. By the end of fifth grade, Cas was sure they'd be inseparable, which was an issue since they wouldn't be in all of the same classes in sixth grade. They would cross that bridge when they came to it, though, because for a while there, everything was really, really good.

…

In the two Winchester households, everything was good for years. There was drama here and there, which was to be expected in their domestic life, but Sam, Elle, and Dean's jobs were all going well, Cas's writing career was great, the kids were happy and getting good grades, and they went on vacations and road trips a lot, just for the hell of it, just to make the kids happier.

Tommy played baseball and was doing really well. Marie was great at soccer. Clare was really good at getting in trouble.

She had a knack for it. She was doted over so much because of her sister that he assumed it was just overwhelming to her. He tried not to be like that when she was at their house and talked to Sam and Elle about it once, to which they bristled and got frustrated at him for. He was sure he was right though.

She was so smart and had really good grades. It was just that she _loved_ to be stubborn and was sent to detention far more often than Sam and Elle liked. Tommy had been to detention before, though Marie hadn't. It didn't strike Cas as a big deal once or twice, but Clare _frequented_ the detention room.

…

Tommy had gone to homecoming with some random girl he was friends with but didn't like the first year, and the next year he went with a group of friends, but he'd never taken a date. When he was a junior—and Cas realized before homecoming that _holy crap,_ Tommy was a _junior_ and Marie was a _freshman_—he went with a date, his first girlfriend. Marie went with her first boyfriend. Clare was going with her first girlfriend, too.

Marie, Clare, and Elle all went off dress shopping, while Cas, Sam, Tommy, and Dean all agreed that there was no need for tux shopping. Any nice tux would do, and they had plenty of nice ones for him to wear without going off to buy one. They all stayed home when the girls went out. Tommy actually went up to his room for a while, before coming out and asking if he could drive over to Lydia's—his girlfriend's.

"Sure," Dean said after glancing at Cas for confirmation.

"Thanks, Dads," he said, going and getting the keys for his car. _His_ car, of course. As much as Dean and Cas loved their kids like nothing else in the entire world, there was no way in hell either of them were driving their Impala anytime soon.

…

Tommy looked extremely handsome at homecoming. Clare and Marie were beautiful in their dresses and Cas felt like this was some kind of gateway into another life for the two girls. They were becoming young adults. Soon—_way _too soon—they'd be driving, and then going off to college, and then—gone. Off living their lives.

Cas took a picture on his phone of Tommy, Clare, and Marie altogether before sending them off on their way. Tommy was driving them and they were to be back by curfew.

Sam, Elle, Dean, and Cas all stayed back at Cas and Dean's that night, having an adult night, drinking a little and watching sports and talking and reminiscing.

Tommy wanted to follow Sam's steps and become a lawyer. They talked about that. They talked about Sam's career as a lawyer, Elle's kids at school, Cas's books, Dean's job as a mechanic. They just _talked_, and talked and ate and drank and watched until the kids came home, smiling and seeming to have had a lot of fun.

Elle, Sam, and Clare soon left, the adults tired and ready to sleep.

Marie said that Clare had had her first kiss that night and she wondered if she was going to tell Sam and Elle, and not to tell them until Clare did because she was sure she would eventually.

Tommy had his first kiss with his first girlfriend, but according to Marie, it wasn't _actually_ his first kiss.

Marie was still, apparently, kissless, which Tommy testified to, so they knew it had to be true if he said that even after she told them about how he'd kissed someone before.

They went to bed before the teenagers did that night. It was a weekend, so there were faint sounds of their music mingling from their different rooms as Cas drifted off to sleep.

…

The kids graduated. They moved out, went to college. It wasn't long before Cas and Dean were alone in their house again. Their ages had never really hit him until they were gone. They were supposed to be in their forties, maybe, older but young enough to have life left in them after their kids left.

Dean was fifty-eight and he was fifty-five. They were far from young, inching towards sixty. But hell, in comparison to the average longevity of a hunter's life, they should've been _proud_ to be as old as they were.

They sat around a lot, for lack of much else to do for a while, trying to find some sort of rhythm and routine now that Marie was off at college and Clare wasn't visiting all the time because she was too. They eagerly looked forward to breaks and holidays for chances to see the kids again, always having enjoyed those days more after Tommy went to college since he got to come back home. Tommy came home often, though, since he went to school just over an hour away from where they lived. Marie went a few hours away to be a college professor. She majored in a lot of history things. Clare was an hour away from Marie, the farthest from all of them, off to be an architect.

Tommy came home weekend after a big test, just for the hell of it, so he could see everyone for the weekend. He went out with his high school friends that still lived in town Friday night and stayed with Cas and Dean all Saturday. They were going to have dinner over at Sam and Elle's on Sunday.

He video chatted Clare and Marie on Saturday with them and they all talked. His tablet thing had really good, modern video chatting. He didn't really understand much of it, but then again, he was an old man who still thought iPhones were really big advancements in the world's technology, when iPhones and iPads and all those i-electronics were becoming old news.

When they went to dinner on Sunday, Elle knew as little about those modern things as he did, but Sam, Dean, and Tommy tried to explain it to them. Dean had retired as a mechanic by then and was more about helping people around town with technological problems. He knew a lot about that stuff, enjoyed learning how those things worked, and picked up on it really easily from online class-type things and books he'd gotten. He knew more about that than Sam anymore, surprisingly.

Cas was just a writer, and Elle a kindergarten teacher. They didn't need to know how it all worked. But they let the guys talk, entertained by them.

…

Clare went to southern Vermont, building cool Vermonter buildings, and Tommy stayed in Boston, where he went to college, lawyering away—Dean insisted lawyering should be a word, to both Sam and Tommy's dismay—and Marie taught in New Hampshire, not far from Clare. They all stayed close to where Sam, Elle, Cas, and Dean lived, which made them all very happy.

Clare got another girlfriend in 2046, the same year she started to really further her architectural career. They became serious and she brought her over to the house one weekend. Her name was Piper Brookston and she was actually about as sweet as a perfect could get and they were so happy.

A little while later, in mid-2046, Marie met Oliver, the guy she was getting pretty serious with, and in 2048, Tommy met his girlfriend, Annalisa.

…

Marie didn't marry Oliver, but Clare married Piper in 2050. Marie dated Craig Something, Nate Whatever, and Ryan Wesling before she found the love of her life in Ryan. Tommy would go on to marry Annalisa Trott.

These were very important things in Cas and Dean's lives not only because they were their children's and their niece's weddings, but also because these were the people that would bring to them the next round of amazing things: their grandchildren. While Cas continued to type away and Elle continued to teach, Sam and Dean waited patiently for their grandchildren, with little else to do since they were retired.

Cas and Dean made pies all the time. It was just kind of their thing. Over the years, both of them had gotten good at making homemade pies, but they honed their skills with little else to do, and the results were always very satisfying.

…

Their first grandchild came in 2049, a year after they got married and two years after they started dating. Olivia Winchester was born on January 6, 2049. Cas and Dean raced to the hospital up in Boston to be there when Annalisa had her, getting there just afterward when Tommy was racing around looking for them.

"Did everything go okay?" Cas asked, going up to his son.

Tommy nodded. "Yeah," he said, and Cas and Dean both smiled happily. "I didn't know what to do, though. You weren't here and Annalisa's parents aren't here."

"Can we see her?" Dean asked, to which Tommy nodded, leading them into Annalisa's room where she was holding the baby, smiling and half-laughing half-crying.

"Oh, hi," she said, seeing them, but immediately she returned her gaze down to the girl in her arms. "We're naming her Olivia."

"That's such a pretty name," Dean said, smiling and approaching the bed. Cas just watched him for a second, smiling softly. Dean was seventy years old but still as lively as ever, a hunter's energy burned into him but no longer hopeless as it had been when he was young. He was always so happy, so grateful.

"Isn't it?" Annalisa said quietly as Cas joined beside Dean, taking his boyfriend's hand and stroking it with his thumb, marveling at his own age of sixty-seven as well.

…

Tommy and Annalisa visited on January 24, Dean's birthday and Cas's memory of his birthday from the false grace memories, bringing Olivia along with them. Sam, Dean, Elle, Cas, Marie, Clare, and their spouses all doted over the new addition to the Winchester family. Sam was probably the most enchanted by the girl. Although it was a stretch, there was something in her eyes that was so similar to Diana it ached but Cas was sure that was what drew Sam to her.

Dean's seventieth birthday was mostly just them sitting around talking and eating pie. That was what Dean liked anymore, really. To have his family all sitting in one place, and to be able to hold and love his new little granddaughter, was the best birthday Dean could have. Cas stayed close to him the whole time, loving how overwhelmingly happy his boyfriend was that day.

Afterward, Tommy and Annalisa stayed in Tommy's old room, using his old crib for Olivia. Marie and Ryan stayed in Marie's old room. Clare and Piper went to Sam and Elle's house to stay in Clare's old room. Once everything was cleaned up and it was figured out who would stay where, Cas and Dean went up to their room and sat quietly in the dark for a little bit, in some state between wanting to talk and wanting to sleep.

"I had fun tonight," Dean said quietly.

"I'm glad," Cas said softly, smiling at him in the dim light of the room and kissing him briefly. "I did too."

"Olivia is so cute," he said. "I love grandkids."

"Me too," he said, eyes shutting slowly.

"I love you," he said distantly, and Cas nodded, returning it, voice barely above a whisper.

…

Over the next three years, two more of their grandchildren were born. Tommy and Annalisa had Bryce in 2051 and Marie and Ryan had Iris in 2052. Olivia grew to be an energetic, sweet little three-year-old that idolized her Great Uncle Sam but also loved her Grandpa and Papa—Cas and Dean respectively—like crazy. Cas knew that they loved her back a lot.

Bryce was deaf, losing his hearing when he was one, which was devastating to Tommy and Annalisa. Part of it may have been the selfish little thing in the back of their minds going, _How are we going to raise a deaf son?_ but Cas was sure the majority of their devastation was due to the fact that they were sad their son would never hear, never experience all that that entailed.

Tommy and Annalisa were supposed to take classes for sign language, which they'd do over the summer. Sam and Elle were already looking into sign language classes not long after it happened, and Dean and Cas decided they'd take it with them but they'd let them find the classes. They were sad as well that Bryce would never experience sound, at least not at an age where he would process and remember it, but there was nothing they could do about it but love him the same and help him in any way they could.

It was hard to learn sign language, which they understood when they took the classes to do so. They had to focus and absorb, and by the time they were over, they were all relieved, grateful that they could talk to Bryce when he was old enough to understand but also wishing it didn't have to come with going through those courses. They were all simply too old to learn some new language anymore, especially one to do with their hands. But for a grandchild, they'd do anything.

…

Dean's health declined throughout the year of 2053. There was nothing really wrong with him other than the fact that he was seventy-four years old and was just dying from age. Cas didn't know how much longer he had with him, but just as he did every other second of his life, he treasured it.

In October of that year, Tommy and Annalisa had their third and final child, Rosie. Rosie was so small and, well, rosy, it was ridiculous. She was adorable.

The excitement from her birth lasted a month. Dean saw Rosie all of three times in that month, and that would be all he saw of him. He died on November 12. His heart just quit. They had gone to bed the night before, a nondescript November 11, Dean happy as ever and well-fed from a good supper and pie for dessert. They had watched TV for a while and then went up to their room. They talked for a few minutes like they usually did before going to sleep.

"I wonder when Marie and Ryan will come visit with Iris again," Dean had said quietly, looking at Cas's face.

"Soon, I hope," he had replied quietly, eyes shutting.

"Yeah. I wonder if they've learned sign language for Bryce yet," he'd said, and Cas had been able to tell he was starting to drift off.

"Clare and Piper said they were," he'd told him, although he was pretty sure dean already knew that. But this was just their thing, talking quietly about whatever right before falling asleep.

"Yeah." He shifted slightly in bed. "Love you, Cas."

"Love you," he said before going to sleep.

The next morning, he woke up late and realized Dean wasn't right. It didn't take long to figure out that he was dead. For a second, he had no idea what to do and he got quickly out of bed, but then as he was stumbling away, looking at Dean's body, it hit him that Dean was _dead._ He went to sleep alive and okay and never woke up.

He called 911, holding back the crying until he had to say, "My boyfriend died in his sleep." Because it was crazy. Dean _died._ Dean was never coming back. Dean would never sing or talk or laugh or smile or anything ever again except in Cas's memory, and that just wasn't okay. Dean had gotten a peaceful death, which was amazing, but—it wasn't okay.

…

Cas got a cat.

It wasn't on purpose. He was still lonely and upset and lost because of Dean's death, and he was in no mood to leave the house much. The house hurt, but he was afraid if he left the house, when he came back all the traces of Dean that kept him okay, that reminded him he'd been happy and things would be okay, would be gone.

He was almost certain that he'd die of grief not long after Dean died, like people say many old couples do. He wasn't sure if that was actually a thing, but he was sure it would happen.

That cat was probably what kept him alive. It showed up one day and rushed inside his house when he came home from Sam and Elle's house. He couldn't get it to leave no matter what he did. He forced it back outside but it only ran back in when he came back in the next time.

Eventually he gave up. The cat was there to stay.

He bathed it first, which was an adventure, but it was more cooperative than he'd thought. In that adventure, he found that the fluffy cat was a boy. He wasn't really all that old. Cas named him Jimmy. He didn't really know why.

…

Angus was born in July of 2054. The visits to their tiny little down by Marie and Clare were getting fewer and farer in between as they built their lives there, rooted to the spot, no time for visits with relatives. Cas didn't blame them. He wasn't angry with them. Tommy visited a lot, having moved just twenty minutes away. He and Annalisa didn't like how crazy Boston could get and preferred a smaller city to raise Olivia, Bryce, and Rosie in. Tommy missed Dean a lot, and Olivia once asked him where Papa was. He held back the tears as he answered, still not entirely over lonely the house was without Dean.

Jimmy helped a lot, though. He was a good, sweet, cuddly cat that cooperated when Cas needed him to and provided comfort and companionship.

Clare and Piper adopted Jace in 2055.

Cas helped with Bryce a lot as he got older. He drove the twenty minutes in the Impala—which felt so empty without Dean—to Tommy often, just to see his son and grandkids and daughter-in-law. He loved seeing them. Sam and Elle loved watching Jimmy, too, so it was a good thing for everyone.

Cas exceeded seventy, and then seventy-five, and there didn't seem to be any stop in sight for him. He lived for the days when he would get to see his family, went over to Sam and Elle's all the time, and adored his cat, spoiling the thing until the cat loved him so much he never left Cas's side when they were home.

All of his grandchildren seemed to like him, although he wasn't sure. He knew that Iris, Angus, and Jace didn't like the trip all the way down to them, but they seemed to like staying the night with him when they arrived. Clare and Marie were thinking about moving back to Massachusetts, although they were reluctant to uproot their lives in New Hampshire and Vermont.

By the time Cas turned eighty, they still hadn't moved out of the states, but they did make promises to visit much more, which they kept.

…

Sam died when Cas was ninety-two, or according to the false grace memories, he was ninety-two. Sam was ninety-one. It was painful when he died, but in the end, he didn't live much longer.

His health started to go downhill in 2075, the year after Sam died. Jimmy had died six years ago and Cas didn't want another cat, knowing he couldn't live much longer. Jimmy had been an old cat, sixteen years old actually, and had given Cas company for fourteen of those years. For the next six, he relied on Sam and Elle for that, and visits from his children and niece and grandchildren.

He was at Elle's—and it was hard not to think of it as Sam and Elle's anymore, just as it was hard not to think of his home as Dean's too, the traces of Dean still everywhere, although the essential things, like _him_, or his smell, or the sounds he made, were all long gone.

"I haven't seen Bobby in sixty years," he said after a moment, and that struck him as really, really odd. How could he have just lost contact with someone for that long? He didn't remember ever hearing of him after that first day he woke up with the false grace memories.

"Bobby Singer?" Elle asked, frowning over at him and looking up from the book she'd been reading.

Cas nodded, lost in thought but still paying vague attention to her.

"Castiel, Bobby Singer died a long time before you woke up with the false grace memories," she told him.

He looked over at him, head cocked slightly. "That's impossible. The very first day, I called him. I remember distinctly, like—like it was just yesterday."

"It could've been your imagination," she said quietly, focusing back down on the book. "That was a stressful day for you, surely."

"No, Elle, there's something off about it," he said, standing up, needing to get to his phone. His fingers were always shaky when he tried to call or text, but he needed to look through his contacts. As he tried to walk over to the table, he collapsed, but he couldn't feel anything. He just drifted.

…

And then he woke up.


	24. Chapter 24

**Okay so turns out I didn't have any time to fanfic-write during NaNo. I kept getting behind with my novel so... And what with the end of the school year, and dealing with all of the stress that brings, I highly doubt I'll be able to update much for this month of May either. I'll try, though.**

**I know this chapter is super short but I have so much homework right now and I just wanted to post what I had so if there's anyone who still wants to read this, they know that I haven't given up. **

**Enjoy I guess :-)**

* * *

_And then he woke up._

_…_

The first thing he was aware of other than the dim light seeming blinding against his eyes was his _young body._ This was a body he felt like he hadn't been in for… for around seventy years. He still felt like he was ninety-three, or should've been, Elle at his side, idly reading a book through her red-rimmed glasses, the pages shaking with her fingers every time she turned the pages. Instead, he was in such a youthful body, so full of life and promise and maybe another seventy years ahead of him, with Dean at his side again, battling the false grace memories without a hope of defeating them, but having a life nonetheless.

The next thing he was aware of was hands grappling at him, an almost familiar voice chanting his name quietly. The sound seemed far off. It was as though her were drifting again, like he did at the end of… of whatever that had been, when he fell, in the room with Elle. He couldn't name it then, but now, his brain working faster than it had been, he pinpointed it as a feeling he'd experienced several times before. He was dying.

"Cas," the sound begged. The voice was so right, so like it belonged to someone he held dear, but he couldn't place it. He couldn't glue the voice to a mouth and the mouth to a face and the face to a body and the body to a name. "Castiel, please. _C'mon_, please, we killed it. You're safe now. Just don't die. Please don't die."

Another voice joined. Both of them seemed sad. He couldn't feel more than their hands, couldn't hear more than their voices, couldn't see anything. "_Cas._ You've got to do this. Shit, call Dean."

_Dean._ He'd do anything for that name. He'd upend solar systems and rip apart constellations for that name. He'd do anything for it, even if it meant anything involved pulling himself out of this blissful oblivion.

He struggled, clawed at the barriers holding him down, dragging him, whispering that it was time to go. He wouldn't move on if that name still had a meaning in the world, if there was still a Dean Winchester somewhere to love.

And then there was warmth, a familiarity, recognizable hands and a welcome voice, and he was in those arms again, those warm and safe arms, and that voice was whispering.

…

When he woke up, he was at Bobby's again. That confused him, because last he remembered, Bobby apparently died long before his memory, but he remembered talking to him. His head hurt a little bit and he was slightly cold.

He sat up, looking around at the house he knew so well and yet hadn't seen in seventy years. He couldn't remember the feeling of being old anymore, but the memories were all still intact other than that basic feeling of age.

As soon as he sat up, someone flocked him. His eyes widened slightly when he saw Balthazar above him. He thought for a moment he was dreaming but he knew, somehow, that that wasn't true. Balthazar was actually there. Everything before—that had been the dream.

"What happened?" he asked quietly, afraid of whatever the answer was. As much as he wanted his brothers back, and had wanted them since the beginning of that—that _dream_—he didn't want to give up his life. He didn't want for it to not be real. He wanted Dean, and his love, and his children, and his niece, and his grandchildren, and his grandnephew.

"You were in a djinn dream," Balthazar explained, tone as soft as his, but sympathetic too. "You were there for, like, five days. I don't think you were really alive when we got you, but Dean did—_something._ He couldn't do much, and he left as soon as he was done."

Cas held in the tears and nodded slightly, wiping futilely at his eyes. "I-I…" He trailed off and cleared his throat slightly. "_Dean._ We- I… I can't. I don't want this. I want the dream."

Balthazar seemed slightly uncomfortable. "You…?"

"I want the dream," he insisted, shaking his head, standing up, ready to leave and get in the Impala and find another djinn, one that wouldn't make Diana die, one that wouldn't kill Dean first, one that would let him have everything as before except those two things, with Diana's children and he and Dean dying holding each other's hands.

"Where are you going?" he said, stepping forward, grabbing his wrist to hold him there. He forced him back down on the couch. "Tell me about it. No, don't say you don't want to. _Tell me about it._"

He swallowed hard. He felt like it was wrong or something, to tell Balthazar about the dream. He had no place there, except as a false grace memory, to be mourned but long ago having been done away with, the mourning over, acceptance replacing it. Balthazar wasn't _real_, and to be telling him about what he'd believed was real for so long—he didn't want it. He didn't want to.

"I woke up with Dean," he started, because that was all he could manage at first, remembering that day so long ago. _I promise this isn't a dream,_ he'd said.

_Well, Dean, you lied,_ Cas thought bitterly.

"Oh." Balthazar shifted slightly and let out a breath. "And what happened?"

He shook his head. "I can't," he said, because really, he _couldn't._ He couldn't tell anyone about these things that he'd held dear for so long. He couldn't tell anyone about his life. It hit him slowly that it had all but died, everything in it dying as well. All of those things he wanted back were gone for good. All those names, all those loves, all those memories—they were nothing, nonexistent, and this pain was worse than the pain of finding out Balthazar and Gabriel were false grace memories. He loved his brothers with all his heart, but he loved his children _more._ They were his, his kids, his—his everything.

"Cas, please," Balthazar said gently, reaching out to him. "It'll help."

"Don't tell me that," he said, blinking back tears. "You don't _know_. You don't know, Balthy. You can't know, ever. I don't want anyone to."

"Help me understand," he said. "Help me know."

"You weren't there!" he said, standing up again, pushing him away when he tried to force him back now. He was being too gentle, too nice, too comforting, and it wasn't working. It was only infuriating him. "You were _fake._ I imagined you up. My grace did. I was an angel. I used to be. And I was happier there. I don't want this, I don't want you, I don't want Gabe—I want that. I want my family."

Balthazar looked hurt and he seemed to be swallowing down anger. _Good,_ he thought, furious. He wanted him angry. "Just be reasonable here, Castiel," he said, the sympathy gone from his voice. "That was a dream. This is reality. It's _supposed_to be perfect. But this is the real world, man, and you've got to get your head out of the fake one."

"It wasn't perfect," he said. If it was, Dean would've lived. Diana would've. Bryce wouldn't have been deaf. Marie and Ryan wouldn't be so unwilling to visit. Sam wouldn't have died before Elle. That world felt so real. That world was the world he wanted.

"Then why do you want it?" Balthazar asked, genuinely confused.

Castiel shook his head. He would explain, he really would, if he thought Balthazar ever had a chance of understanding. It wasn't anything against Balthazar, really, because he was sure if he hadn't lived it, he wouldn't understand either. He was different, now. He felt more connected to the Castiel of that life, the once-angel, the creature that fell and became a man for the love of his life, a star that morphed into a human. He liked that guy. He had been that guy for longer than he'd been the broken, dejected, empty always-human longing for a distant angel like a pathetic teenager in a Hallmark movie.

He didn't want to be in the living room. He wanted to go up to his room. He didn't want to see Bobby or Gabriel, and he wanted to stop seeing Balthazar. He didn't even want to see Dean. He fought so hard not to die for him, and now here he was, resenting him, because he wasn't _his_ Dean. It hurt to think like that, but it was true. He couldn't deny the fact that when he thought of the angel Dean of the "real" world and the human Dean of the djinn dream, they were two completely different people, and he'd just known human Dean longer. He'd fallen in love with human Dean more times, again and again over the course of seventy years, even after he'd died.

"I don't know how to help, Cas," Balthazar said, and it was so ridiculous it actually made Castiel angry. He knew that was irrational, but he couldn't help it.

"You can't!" he said. "I don't know if I really even want you to try. It's pointless. Those people in the dream—they may as well have _died_, man."

"Who were they?" Balthazar asked.

Cas just walked away, past him, and up to his room. He laid down in his bed and stared up at the ceiling for a long time, picturing the sky above their house in Oregon, and their house in Massachusetts. He wondered if those houses were real places. He loved both of them. He missed those houses already.

…

Eventually he ended up falling asleep. He didn't leave his room when he woke up. He went to the window and looked out, hating the view of the old cars outside. He wanted the view of an apple pie life front yard or a relaxing, peaceful backyard. He wanted home, where Dean was at his side and the rest of his family was close or at least just a phone call away.

Gabriel came to his room eventually, two plates and two cups in hand. He sat them all on the dresser and then sat on the bed. Cas hadn't returned to it yet, and he didn't look back at his brother.

"I don't know what to do," he said, and while his voice was quiet, the volume within it was aching to be released, an obvious effort being made to keep it down. Cas didn't need to see the body language, the expression, the eyes. He knew his brother's voice well enough to understand what it was when he was angry.

He didn't respond. It wasn't worth it. He wasn't escaping a lecture. He didn't feel like trying. Maybe he even deserved a lecture. It really wasn't worth thinking about, so he didn't.

"You're going to sit up here, right?" he said, and Cas thought he was nice enough to at least spare a nod, so he did, because he would. "You're going to sit, and grieve, and not tell us why. I know it's only been a day, Castiel, and I don't expect you to bounce right back up. I'd be the jackass if I did. I just need you to tell us _something_, to not push us away. Okay? You're dying. Dean did what he could, but it wasn't enough." He paused, waiting for Cas to say something. When he didn't, he heard Gabriel get up.

"Don't," he snapped, moving toward him, narrowing his eyes. "Don't think you can do this. You're going to _hell_, Cas. If you die, you don't get to live in that world with your perfect version of Dean. You get _hell._ If you live, there's a chance we can save you." He paused again, not seeming to expect him to speak but just gathering his thoughts. Cas was watching him out of the corner of his eye. He wanted to collapse. He knew everything that Gabriel was saying was true, had known from the start. But he just… needed time. Needed all the time in the world. Needed to _not_ be destined for hellfire.

"Cas, you need to help us," he said, the bitterness in his voice growing to full anger. "You're dying, but the rest of us? We're staying in this fucking world, and I want it to be apocalypse-free. You're the star player in the apocalypse, it seems, so your ass needs to get up and prevent it. Okay?"

He nodded slightly, understanding all of this but not feeling like acknowledging how stupid he was being aloud. All of this grief could be felt later when there was time. War didn't call for emotions. They let demons out of hell, and it seemed the angels didn't give a rat's ass, so they had to pick up their pieces and shove the fuckers back into hell before he followed them himself and before they started the end of the world.

"Say something," Gabriel insisted.

"Okay," Cas said, a little frustrated with Gabriel's frustration. He _knew_ he was an idiot. He _knew_ he was selfish. He'd already nodded. "Okay? I get it. _I get it._ I'll stop fucking moping."

"Thank you," he said, sighing long-sufferingly.

"I want to be alone, though. But tell me when we're headed out for a case," he said.

Gabriel looked at him for a second and then stepped forward. "We'll figure this out."

The next time they even saw another angel, they had successfully managed to deal with fifteen individual demons and one group of four. Sam arrived in a flash and looked down at them as they settled down after that big go, and Cas stared up at him for a long time, remembering Elle at Sam's side, remembering their kids and their grandkids.

He pushed himself out of those thoughts and stood up. He could tell from the look in Sam's eyes that they had something to do for the angels, but instead of telling them, Sam just looked at him for a moment. Then he said, "Adam is now working with Dean for his grace."

Cas stared at Sam for a long time before nodding. He tried not to let the betrayal get to him much. It wasn't hard. He was still thinking about his djinn dream. He felt weak from how close to dead he was before, although he didn't let any of that on to Balthazar or Gabriel. He had been so stupid before, so selfish, that he knew he needed badly to make up for it.

He hadn't talked nearly as much as usual since he woke up. He only had a couple months before he died. He felt like he should've been spending time with his brothers, with Bobby, with Dean, but there was a war, and he wanted redemption for his ridiculous before he was killed and before his friends and family were all thrust into the thick of the war. He wanted something to grasp onto as he died, something to think about. "At least I did this," "at least I did that"—_something._

Sam stayed for a little bit, talked to Gabriel in the other room of the motel mostly. Then he flew off with a short wave.

…

A month before Cas was going to say goodbye to his Earthly life and move into hell, he saw Dean again. It was in a dream, and it wasn't for long.

He was just sitting out before a lake, staring out into the peaceful water, the wind giving him goosebumps. He sipped at the beer in his hand, which was cold and sweating due to the hotness of their around him. It really was sweltering, but Cas didn't notice if he tried not to. Dean appeared next to him, the sound of wings filling the otherwise silent air. A bird chirped somewhere and fish flopped in the water, as if nature was stirred by the noise of Dean's wings.

Cas looked up at him. "Are you real or is this the dream?"

Dean's face clued him in. He couldn't replicate that face in his dreams. When he dreamt, he did so of the look Dean gave him only here and there in real life and so many times in the djinn dream. This face was so solemn, so hard and heavy and serious. This wasn't the Dean that Cas cared about. This was a soldier.

"I'm real," he said. "I just want you to know…" His face crumpled, eyebrows turning inward, forehead creasing. "I'm going to try to save you. I just want you to know."

Cas looked up at him for a long time, and slowly a smile appeared on his face. He shook his head. "Well, thank you, Dean," he said sincerely, "but it's a bit past that point."

Dean stared back, and he flew away when Cas looked back out at the water.

Cas let out a long, empty sigh.


	25. Chapter 25

**So I've decided how this story is going to end and it's all written out and now all I have to do is actually write the thing. I think it's going to be somewhere around 35 chapters which means that there's not a lot left and we'll most likely be done by the end of the summer, and then I'm going to start working on two more destiel fics heavily that have been brewing for a long time and bc I'm writing this at 3am and I'm excited I'll just explain those really quickly.**

**So one is called Phillip (that's not its actual name, it's an inside joke bc the acronym is almost Phillip [I think it's FALLGTPA {and actually that looks nothing like Phillip what was I thinking}]) and it's basically a "Fuck you season 9 I'm going to erase you and fix you" bc what even was season 9**

**And the other is right now just called Boggart!Cas and it originates from a thing I had to do in class where I was given like half of this weird story and I had to like finish it and so I went crazy and basically it turned into a full-fledged spn AU universe and it's going to be half told from the perspective of a little girl named Maya and half told from a 3rd person omniscient (I think omniscient but I can't remember the other type of 3rd person and I can't be bothered to look it up) view of mostly Dean.**

**And basically they're both pretty cool so if you're sad about this fic ending then just remember: You can continue to deal with my horribly under-edited writing with a complete and utter lack of a schedule for years to come.**

**Also if anyone wants to ask me questions about any future writings/this writing/generally talk to me about writing, spn, or literally anything bc I love talking to people and you people are awesome: my tumblr is casdeansam or something I don't really remember so I'd consult a previous chapter to see what my actual tumblr is bc I don't remember but most likely it's casdeansam?**

**Also, spn spoilers for 10x21 or 22 or something:**

**I'm not killing off Charlie. In fact I'm bringing her in. Because fuck the stupid asshole spn writers Charlie was great and I'm not going to get into this rant here bc I've ranted so much about the subject of Charlie's death already**

**ALSO WHAT THE FUCK THIS STORY IS 4 MONTHS AWAY FROM BEING A YEAR OLD I HAVE NO RECOLLECTION OF WORKING ON THIS SHIT FOR NEARLY A YEAR**

* * *

_Cas let out a long, empty sigh._

* * *

May 2, 2008. 11:23 p.m.

Cas had his eyes on the clock. Balthazar was pouring goofer dust around all the walls of the room of the little house a bit outside Sioux Falls that they were in. This was the house he would die in. They would burn him at Bobby's. It wasn't discussed, but it was just a fact.

He was afraid. He was shaking and he kept seeing his brothers' faces morph into twisted images, into horrible, horrible things. Ruby was with him. Ruby and her demon-killing knife. They had an angel blade. At some point after 11:12, he started to see Ruby's true form. She was disgusting.

He found if he thought detachedly, he shook less and it was less likely that he'd break down.

He gripped his angel blade and watched as Balthazar finished with the goofer dust and Gabriel went around the room with salt for good measure. He wanted them to leave until it was over in case the hellhounds decided to take a few bites out of them too, but they refused.

Cas's heart was thu-thu-thumping rapidly and he waited in anticipation for any sight of Dean, Adam, or Sam. Any one of them would've been welcomed.

He gave up on them by 11:27.

"You okay?" Balthazar said quietly, pulling Cas over to the corner of the room as Ruby talked to Gabriel about what was going to happen, as if he needed it explained anymore.

"No, not really," he said, shaking his head. "But considering the circumstances, I'm relatively better than I could be."

Balthazar paused for a second before nodding. "Well, that's definitely better than being worse than you could be."

Cas nodded in agreement, clutching his angel blade and looking around the room. "I'd really feel much more comfortable if you and Gabe would leave."

He shook his head. "No way, Cas," he said. He crossed his arms, gun drooping downward out of his hand. "We're staying here with you."

Cas sighed heavily and leaned back against a wall, wanting to slump down, but he'd break the salt and goofer dust lines if he did. "You guys are too stubborn."

By 11:43 he was starting to hear things that weren't there. He would hear Azazel whisper to him, and he'd jerk around to find nothing there. He felt someone grab his shoulder but everyone else was across the room at that point.

At 12:00 exactly—he watched the clock change—he heard hellhounds barking and growling. He froze for a moment before standing up tall and bracing himself for the fight.

It didn't take them nearly as long as he hoped for them to break in. By then he, Balthazar, and Gabriel had all hugged, had said nearly tearful goodbyes, and then the faced the door waiting, anticipating, Ruby nearby and closest to Gabriel.

They burst in with a loud noise. They were disgusting, bigger than any dog he'd ever seen. They were black and bony, their skin hanging loosely over their bodies like thin blankets draped across their forms. A reddish-yellowish substance oozed from their skin, and their eyes were a perfect crimson. Their mouthed foamed gray, and their short, stubby, thick tails wagged impatiently as Balthazar and Gabriel attempted to fight them. He and Ruby did the best, what with them being able to see them.

Of course it was to no avail. And for a moment as he collapsed, claws pushing into his skin and knocking him down, he felt empty. Numb. And then pain ripped through him, followed by fear. He shouted and screamed and vaguely he thought he saw Ruby holding Gabriel and Balthazar back, but he was too terrified, too in pain to react. He felt everything—watched everything—on his body being torn to shreds. He watched himself die.

And then there was a long, sloping tunnel, and at the end was hellfire.

* * *

The hellhounds shredded Cas's body but they left him be after he was dead. Gabriel was appalled, and he felt something huge building up in his chest, threatening to explode and shatter him so entirely that he would be irreparable.

They carried his body outside and into the Impala, laying him over a sheet in the backseat. Gabriel walked away and threw up. Ruby left.

Balthazar got in the driver's seat and Gabriel curled up in the passenger's, shaking and shutting his eyes, pretending that it was Cas over there in the driver's seat and Balthazar was sleeping in the back. He still felt sick to his stomach, but he knew that Cas wouldn't want him to throw up in the car.

"We've got to burn him," Balthazar said at one point on the way back. It was about an hour until they were at Bobby's. They shouldn't have gone so far away.

"We're not burning him." There was no indignity in his voice. His voice was dead, monotonous. But they weren't going to. The idea of burning Cas made him feel sick to his stomach, and he had to take a second to try not to throw up again.

"We can't bury him," Balthazar said, frowning slightly over at him. "He deserves a hunter's funeral."

He looked over at him and shook his head, looking down at his lap and breathing slowly. It was hard to think of anything but the crushing pain in his chest and the intense throbbing in his head that was appearing. He had never felt tinier, and all of the pain he was feeling felt twice as big as him. He was overwhelmed.

"I'm going to bring him back," he told his brother resolvedly, and he looked out the window. He was determined. His mind wasn't going to be changed, and he knew that Balthazar knew that as well as he did.

He watched and yet didn't as the world passed by them, and soon they turned music on, blaring classic rock, and Gabriel bit hard down on his cheek until he tasted blood. It didn't stop the tears from coming. Once he felt the first one slide down his cheek, like the first drop of water on a rainy day that leads way to a downpour, he was done with. He leaned his head against the window even though the rattle hurt and shook slightly.

"Gabe," Balthazar murmured, voice shaky. They were finally pulling into Bobby's driveway. He shook his head and got out as soon as the Impala was parked, not wanting to be around the car anymore. He would talk to Balthazar inside, would hug him and cry with him inside, but he needed to be inside.

Bobby was there waiting for him when he came in. Gabriel felt stupidly tiny, stupidly young.

"He in the car?" he asked quietly.

Gabriel nodded, wiping at his eyes. Tears were still flowing.

"Where's Balthazar?" Bobby asked him, his voice gentle and fatherly.

"Outside," he said. He looked up at him. "I don't want to burn him, Bobby. We can't burn him."

"Don't you think he deserves a proper hunter's funeral, though?" he said. "It's safer that way too."

Gabriel shook his head. "No. He's coming back. We'll find a way to save him," he said. "I can't burn him."

Bobby watched him for a long time before nodding. "Okay."

* * *

The question was where to bury him. They couldn't very well bury him in a cemetery because how would anyone deal with a body showing up in the ground out of nowhere in a cemetery? They decided to just do it in the middle of nowhere, about an hour away from Sioux Falls. The hour drive from Bobby's to the place was horrible, but they took two cars—no one wanted to sit in the back with Cas's dead body—and Bobby drove the Impala. Gabriel curled up in his seat in one of Bobby's trucks as Balthazar drove.

They buried him almost silently, until at the very end Balthazar said, "Fuck the angels' apocalypse. What kind of angel would let someone like Cas die for their sake?"

They went back to Bobby's after a while and Gabriel cleaned up what blood got on the backseat of the Impala. He went up to his room and waited until nightfall. He grabbed everything in the room and left while Bobby and Balthazar were sleeping. He took the Impala.

By that time next week, he had a new phone, new fake IDs, and a new thirst for revenge.

* * *

For the first time since May 3, 2008, at 12:10 a.m., Castiel Novak would take a breath.

It was labored and felt like fire was being forced through his lungs instead of oxygen, but once he got used to it, felt around where he was, he realized that he was alive. This was real. This wasn't something from hell. Things in hell always felt too real, so real that he knew they weren't dreams. What he was feeling then had the quality of a dream, the potential for not being real. Either he was alive and was dreaming, or he was alive and it was too surreal for it to feel like it.

But he wasn't dead.

He pulled a lighter out of his pocket without thinking, fumbling to flick it on. He touched the top of the dark, enclosed space he was in. This was a coffin.

Shit, this was a coffin.

He swallowed down the fear that was rising to the surface. Having a panic attack would help nothing.

"Help!" he shouted—or tried to shout. His croaky voice was no more than a whisper. It almost hurt to try to speak.

He let out a little shaky breath and pulled his jacket off with effort. Taking a big gulp of breath, he wrapped it around his head and then hit the top of the box repeatedly until it broke and the massive pressure of the dirt above him falling down on him hit. He didn't waste any time starting to dig his way up. When his hands finally reached the surface he dug faster, and gasped for breath once he was up. He pulled himself completely out of the ground and took the jacket off his head. He lay on the ground when he was finally out.

After a few minutes he painstakingly pulled himself to his feet and looked around. Everything—the grass, the trees, everything—was flattened outward around his gravesite.

He walked over to the fallen trees and climbed over them. There was no use standing there speculating about them. He needed to get to Bobby and his brothers. He walked for what felt like forever, walking and walking and walking, the shirt tied around his waist sliding down a lot and getting really annoying. It was hot as hell.

He finally managed to make his way to a road, and after walking for about twenty minutes on down he found a gas station with a couple cars. Speeding up his pace, he made it to there soon and peered in the window, calling out in his still croaky, airy voice, "Hello?" No one answered so he wrapped his shirt around his hand and busted the window, breaking into the gas station.

The first thing he did was grab a bottle of water and chug in, taking a gasp of breath when it was gone. He crumpled it and tossed it, and then went over to a stack of newspapers to see the date.

September 18, 2008. _September?_

He washed his dirt-caked face off and checked in the mirror for any scars from the horrible attack on the night he died. His shoulder, which had been hurting since he came up, stung a little suddenly, and he lifted up the shirtsleeve. A bright, vividly red handprint was raised on his arm. _What the hell?_

He grabbed more water and some food and put it in a bag. He couldn't do anything about any of his problems until he found Bobby and his brothers so there was no use dwelling on the shoulder mark thing yet. He stole some money as an afterthought and as he was pulling some out of the cash register, the TV started to play static and the radio turned on. He frowned and looked around before grabbing salt and starting to line the windows. An intense ringing suddenly started to grow in volume until there was nothing he could do but cover his ears. The windows broke all around him and it finally stopped. He pulled himself to his feet, grabbed his bag, and went out to the telephone booth outside. Nothing he could do without Bobby, Gabe, and Balthazar.

The first person he thought to call was Bobby. He knew they'd all be there. They had to be, and if they weren't they'd be on a case, but Bobby would be home. "Hey, Bobby, it's me," he said when Bobby's voice came over the phone.

"Who's me?" he answered gruffly.

"Cas," he said.

Bobby immediately hung up. Cas tried to call back but Bobby wasn't having any of it. He went out, stole one of the cars, and drove the way back to Bobby's, eating granola bars and chugging more water. He pulled up and got out, not surprised when Balthazar opened the door and looked terrified.

"What the hell," he breathed out, stepping forward, before regaining his senses and stepping back. He looked behind him quickly, grabbing a knife off the table and coming at him.

"Shit, Balth!" he said, managing not to get stabbed. He grabbed the knife from him quickly. "I'm not a fucking shapeshifter or something!" He cut the back of his arm slightly, wincing a little bit. "See?"

Balthazar stared at him for a long time, until Bobby came to see what was going on. He seemed to have heard Cas's voice because he was holding holy water, anticipating. He splashed it on Cas's face. "I'm not a demon either," he muttered as he stepped in.

They both stared at him for a second before coming in for a hug at the same time, which resulted in an awkward group hug that quickly split up into separate hugs. Bobby grasped the back of his shirt and patted his back, squeezing Cas close. "Shit, you fucking idjit."

He hugged Balthazar next, and Balthazar held tightly to him as well.

"Where's Gabe?" he asked first, before they could go into the whole _how-is-this-possible_ talk.

Bobby and Balthazar looked at each other, which was never a good sign. "You explained what happened to you when you came topside and we'll fill in the last four months you're missing when you're done," Balthazar said. They pulled out beers and sat in the living room, and Cas explained what happened to him quickly.

"It's angels. Gotta be," Balthazar said, taking a drink of his beer. "Can't be Sam, though. We haven't heard from him since—well, you were here last time we heard from him."

"So Dean," Cas said. "No other angel would do this. So what happened while I was gone?"

They explained to him how Gabriel left almost immediately after Cas died and hadn't been heard from since. As far as they knew, he was dead, but they were pretty sure he just went off with Ruby to find the demon deal–holder, Lilith. Since then they'd been going on cases or finding cases to give to other people. They looked constantly for weeks after his disappearance and still had a ton of eyes out for him, but the best they could do was hunt and hope.

"So we've got to look for him," Cas said, frowning and looking between them.

"Maybe if Dean comes back," Balthazar said warily, looking over at Bobby, who nodded in agreement. "It's getting pretty sketchy out there. Demons are everywhere."

"So we have to! Gabe can't be out there with a ton of demons," Cas said, incredulous by the notion that the two of them would let Gabriel out there with just Ruby and himself as protection. He was a good hunter, but he was too young and too iffy alone to deal with all of that without them. Cas was suddenly worried out of his mind for his little brother.

"We can—"

The lights flickered out and the wind howled outside as a storm started up, the heavy rain pattering down on Bobby's rooftop. Thunder and lighting crackled across the sky and the out-of-nowhere storm blew out of proportions. Bobby's front doors swung open quickly and then shut, and in walked a powerful-looking Dean, the shadows of his wings revealed as lighting flashed and thunder clapped.

Cas stared up at him for a second, remembering the last time he truly saw Dean, even before the djinn dream, before the horrible delusions of him in hell, before that final dream of him before he died. He couldn't even remember it clearly, but he wanted to get up and hug the angel, but he stayed sitting on the couch, clutching his beer tightly.

The lights turned back on and the raging thunderstorm outside turned into a light shower. Cas was still staring reverently up at Dean as he smiled sheepishly at them.

"I'm sorry for being gone for so long," Dean said. He was looking directly at Cas.

Cas was pretty sure he wouldn't know what to do in this situation if it was expressly spelled out to him and he stared at it for an hour trying to remember the direct route to success. Instead of finding something intelligent or witty to say, he really just wanted to sit with Dean and talk for hours. He wasn't so blindsided by how cute Dean's vessel was to excuse everything he'd done just to be near him. He wanted to relearn Dean before he did anything else with him.

"How long can you stay?" Balthazar said, finally seeming annoyed with how little Cas was saying to Dean. "Five minutes?"

Dean shook his head. "I… I'm giving up on my grace," he said. "It's not worth it anymore. They can strip me of it, I don't care. I'll still be closer to my Father's mission than most of my siblings."

Cas knew even less and he was slightly annoyed with how little he knew what to do, although he was overwhelmed by how happy he was to hear that Dean was done with the crap that was corrupting the angels. It was selfish. He knew it was, but he almost didn't care about selfishness or selflessness. He had just gotten out of _literal hell_, and it was indeed _literal hell._He deserved a little dose of selfishness.

"You're going to fall?" Cas asked. "You're going to stay with us?"

He nodded. "I was going to do it sooner, but I knew they were going to raise you from hell and I wanted to be the one to piece you back together," he said, so matter-of-factly that it made Cas almost smile. Cas looked over at Bobby and Balthazar who seem just as lost for words as he was. "So… I'm doing this for you. I'm falling for you."

"In what way?" Cas blurted out, and felt his face heat up because that was the most ridiculous thing he could ever say.

But what else could he expect from Dean but the most straightforward answer? "I fell in love with you the first time I saw your soul. You're the Righteous Man, Castiel, and you have the most beautiful soul I've ever seen. It's just taken some time to fall in love with you because you tend to be annoying."

Cas _really_ wished Bobby and Balthazar weren't right there. So much so that he left. He didn't know what else to do. For some reason all he could think of was hell, all those horrible, _terrible_ things that were done to him in hell. He felt sick to his stomach. He went into the bathroom, hanging over the toilet, remembering his flesh flayed in so many ways, eyes gauged out in endless creative styles, limbs ripped or sawed or burned off, never-ending pain and screams and hallucinations. He wanted to be home but he didn't think he'd ever really leave hell. He would always come back to it.

He threw up and then went back to his room, curling up in his bed, still feeling rather sick. He managed to fall asleep, and despite how long he slept, it was one of the most restless sleeps of his life.

When he woke up, Dean was in his room, looking out the window. He turned around when Cas at up. "Hi," he said. "I wanted to talk to you when you woke up so Balthazar told me to just come up here. I hope you don't mind."

Cas shook his head. "It's fine," he said. He patted the end of his bed and Dean came over, sitting down at it. "What's up?"

Dean sighed slightly. "There are many things I want to talk about. First of all, I want to be completely honest with you from now on, and I will tell you that all I know is that you are the Righteous Man, which means the apocalypse is coming. But they need you for the apocalypse and a number of Seals need to be broken to raise Lucifer, so I don't know if that's what they're planning," he said.

"Hang on, raise _Lucifer?_" Cas said, raising his eyebrows.

He nodded. "Yes," Dean said. "That's not our biggest concern. As long as Seals aren't breaking, we're okay. Second of all, I will make sure I help you find Gabriel before my grace is gone. Adam should be coming soon, but there were a few more things he needed to do before he fell. Thirdly, I'm falling. I've decided and I can't go back. I will lose my grace, and I… well, I just want to restart, I believe. That feels very human, so I think you and I should pretend we've never known each other as closely as we have, and we should redo everything. And you can help me with my new humanity. And I can help you with your memories of hell, if you'll allow me."

Cas smiled at him slowly. He didn't think he would like help with his memories of hell, but maybe Dean could open him up. "Okay," he said. "Yeah, restarting sounds perfect, man."

Dean smiled back happily. "Okay," he said as well, quietly, relieved. He held a hand out to him and put it over Cas's. He almost told him how that was considered romantic so they probably shouldn't hold hands if they were restarting, but he didn't care enough to. "How do we restart?"

"If you're staying with us, we can just get to know each other all over again," Cas said, smiling at him.

"Castiel!" Bobby called loudly from downstairs. He stood up, looking over at Dean. They went downstairs together and Gabriel was there next to Bobby.

"Cas," Gabriel said, going over to him and hugging him tightly. "You're alive."

He hugged him back. "Damn it, Gabriel, you don't just go off without telling Bobby and Balthazar," he said as they pulled away, frowning at him with all the frustration he felt. "I know that must've been a difficult time but you just don't, no matter what. You stay in touch at least."

He shook his head. "I'm nineteen, Cas. I'm not a kid anymore."

"I'm not saying you are," he told him calmly. "That's something we all shouldn't do, not just you. It's just something you don't do."

"Well, never mind," Gabriel said, shaking his head. "I don't feel like arguing, do you?"

"What have you been up to, you idjit?" Bobby said, clearly half-furious with him, but also obviously _really _relieved. "And how're you holding up, Cas?"

Cas nodded and looked back at where Dean was, motioning for him to come forward. Balthazar took his turn hugging Gabriel.

"I've just been working," he said. "With Ruby, which is part of the reason I didn't call at first, and I was angry, so I just… never did."

Though everyone was frustrated with Gabriel and concerned for Cas, they quickly came up with the decision to just let Gabriel do what he wanted—although under no circumstances was he to do it in the Impala because that was _Cas's_—as long as he stayed in touch, visited a lot, and didn't do anything extremely dangerous. Cas was sure, to some extent, all of those rules would be broken.

He'd keep his eye out on Ruby.

* * *

Adam showed up finally one day with a small, unhappy smile on his face, coming in like he'd never left, falsely cheery as ever. Dean greeted him with a hug that seemed like the beginning of their fall.

Cas had been out of hell for a week and was slowly drawing further away from the people around him, the nightmares becoming more severe every night. While Dean still had his grace they frequently went on nearby cases and tried to contact Sam, tried to get some idea of what was going on. A rhythm was growing within the occupants of Bobby's house but it was an empty rhythm, one that only acted to make them worse off than before, more frustrated and lost.

Balthazar desperately tried to reach out to Cas as he went up to his room to escape having a panic attack in front of everyone, the flashbacks too horrible, or as he went to the bar to drink away his problems and pass out in a motel room. Dean seemed like he wanted to help but didn't understand the humanness of the situation well enough to get what help he needed to give. Cas was glad he didn't try. He didn't want Balthazar to, either.

Adam and Balthazar spent a lot of time together, and despite the fact that he knew that Bobby was barely holding it together better than any of them, he pretended like he was levelheaded. It would've helped if Cas didn't see straight through the act. He had played his part in it too much. It was job as big brother, as the one who stood in for their mom when she was off.

Things kept happening, but nothing left any mark on any of them. Everything was empty.

* * *

_Power._

It scorched his mind, rendering it blank except for the need.

It literally flowed through his veins, pumping and pulsing with his heart and strengthening him.

It coursed through the bodies of innocents taken captive by the most evil beings, and he drank the power like a vampire, straight from their veins and straight into his.

Power came in the form of money, of well-known names, of countless weapons—but to Gabriel, power was blood, and he kept drinking. He could've been a monster but he wouldn't have known it. He drank, and he slept with Ruby because that felt good, and he searched for Lilith and more demons to exorcise and some to suck dry. And it all felt so good. He was running on a high of feeling so good, so strong, so full and fearless and ready to take down anything. He was powerful. He drank it in like the beer his brothers drank to keep thoughts from entering their minds. He drank it down and wiped his face like he had chugged water after getting tremendously thirsty.

He was strong, getting stronger, getting ready. He was mighty. He was better. He wasn't little Gabriel Novak, little brother of the _Novaks._ He was strong, he was big. He was better. He was best.

He was powerful.

Drink it down, suck them dry, keep drinking. He was frantic for more and he begged Ruby and mourned for the lack of blood while she was gone. He stopped feeling remorse. He called Cas or Balthazar or Bobby and feigned the old, dead Gabriel, and when he hung up, he drank and he reveled in it.

Maybe he was sick, maybe he was as evil as the blood he sucked down, but it felt so good, and what was life but seeking the next time you felt good? Nothing to him. Nothing because he only felt good when he was strong.

_Power._


	26. Chapter 26

_**Woo chapter**_

* * *

_Power._

_…_

Where does a fall start?

Castiel found himself contemplating this time and time again, sometimes alone in his mind when he was sure Dean and Adam weren't peering in, or other times when they were off in another room and he and Balthazar could discuss it together.

Although there was nothing romantic or sexual between them—that Cas knew of—Balthazar and Adam had grown close. It was a good friendship. There was just something about the way they clicked, their banter and the talks alone that Cas didn't know much about, that drew them together, that brought them back to keep talking.

Their friendship led to better conversations on this topic with his little brother. He guessed that the fall starts with when you trip, and Dean tripped into their lives. That was the start of his progression downhill. Then slowly he tried to grasp for something to pull him back up with his family, but when there were no handholds, he fell completely, and he was on his way down.

It started with things as simple as Adam saying, "Shit, I don't think I can heal that cut, sorry," and that was how it stayed for a while—little malfunctions in Dean and Adam. They went on cases where things were cut pretty close because Dean and Adam couldn't heal things all the way and Cas and Balthazar had been taking too much advantage of having angels on their hunting time.

When Gabriel came over with Ruby, they were horrified to see that her wretched true face was fading from their view—what was once back was a dull gray, closer to becoming the color of sickly skin that the impossible horrible blacks and reds that used to be there. Dean described it in as much detail as he could, and although Cas was sure he was glad not to look at her ugly face anymore, he couldn't imagine how scary that must've been for them.

Gabriel came so infrequently they may as well have just said goodbye and let him go off on his own forever.

About a month after Cas had risen from hell, with everything still disturbingly quiet on the supernatural front, they went on a small case in Iowa. A nest of vampires was causing a lot of chaos in Des Moines. Cas drove with Balthazar next to him, Dean behind him and gazing peacefully out the window, and Adam leaning forward pestering them the whole time.

It was a quick case for the nest of vampires was sloppy and they easily found their way to the nest. There were a lot of them, but with two skilled hunters and two angels, it was easier than usual to weed their way through them. In the very back they expected to find the usual haul of about-to-be-turned terrified guys and girls cowering together, but instead they found a lone girl.

"Don't mess with me. You don't want to mess with me," she said, retreating back against the wall. "I'm not like those others. I'm not human. You'll probably die if you try to do what you did to the others."

Cas looked back at the others and then raised his eyebrows at her.

"Yeah, that's right. I'm a, uh, hobbit. Our blood is poisonous to vampires," she said.

"A hobbit?" Balthazar said, smiling slightly.

"Well, Bilbo Baggins, we're hunters," Cas said. "We're rescuing you."

"What is a hobbit?" Dean asked, frowning at Cas as he stepped forward to let the girl out. She stood up and looked between them warily, not trusting them to rescue.

"Hobbits?" Cas said, trying to connect to the girl somehow to get her to trust them. She looked afraid, although she masked it well on her face. She stood bravely although her eyes defied her stance. "What were you going to do if the vampires were diehard Lord of the Rings fans?"

She didn't say anything for a second, and then she said, "I don't know, but I was going to do something."

"Well, nice on the hobbits," he said, smiling at her. "We'll take you home now… What's your name?"

She didn't seem to want to say anything at first, and then she finally said, "Charlie."

"Okay, Charlie. We'll take you home."

Now that she was no longer cowering against the wall, it looked to Cas like she was maybe older than him by a few years or so, but she was still young, only really in her mid-twenties—twenty-eight at most. She had longish red hair, although because of the lighting and the fact that it was dirty, it seemed darker. She was somewhat pale, although she, too, was pretty dirty and bloody.

"I don't really have anywhere to go," she admitted to them after a second, still just standing there and looking at them. "I just moved here. I've been kind of moving around a lot. I don't have anyone to go to." She seemed so sheepish about her loneliness, about her lack of home.

"Well… neither do we," Balthazar chimed in, smiling at her sympathetically. "We know how it feels."

"Right," Charlie said, biting her lip. "Could you, by any chance, help me out, then?"

Cas looked over at Balthazar, defaulting to him. He wondered if Bobby would care if they brought back another straggler to join their little group of hunters. His house was filling up, what with falling angels and Balthazar and Cas and the occasional Gabriel with his pet demon. But what was one more girl? He didn't know where she'd sleep but they were hunting a lot more, anyway. He didn't exactly want to throw her straight into hunting, but he was sure once they taught her—if she wanted to be taught—they'd be back on the road and in motels a lot again.

Balthazar, sensing that the decision was being handed off to him, nodded. "Yeah, why not," he said.

They all went back to the car and Charlie directed them to her motel so they could grab her things. She hurried inside and came out with a bag of stuff that she loaded into the Impala, and as soon as the saw the contents of their trunk, she immediately backed away from the car slightly.

Cas got out to go reassure that they weren't actually crazy killers. She looked at him, her eyes slightly widened.

"It's okay," he told her quickly. "We hunt more things than just vampires, and we need all this stuff to kill them."

"_All_ of it?" she said, raising her eyebrows at him. She was obviously afraid but also looked ready to dart, or do something to save herself. Her eyes were flicking from one direction to the next, the move that Cas knew by heart to mean that she was subconsciously thinking of ways to flee. He could see she was smart, probably pretty brave. Resourceful.

He nodded. "Different things kill different monsters. Some have really ridiculous weapons that kill them. Like… I don't know. There are these things called tricksters, and you can only kill them by stabbing them with a stake dipped in the blood of its victim. Very specific stuff like that."

Charlie looked back at the trunk and spied the bloodied stake they kept in the trunk just in case of a trickster. Then she warily started back toward the car without another word, and Cas went back to the driver's seat.

Dean looked over at him as he got back in and then out at the road again. Cas could imagine his massive wings sort of going through the seat and the car door but having to fold enough so they weren't in Adam's face in the backseat. Maybe that was why Adam was adamant not to have the seat right behind Dean.

They stopped a lot on the way back to Bobby's, for food and bathroom breaks and Charlie's apparently mandatory trips to sightsee things they went by—and they took a lot of inconvenient routes for the sake of her sightseeing, but no one really minded. They reached his house finally, after all of them having a good amount of fun on the way over. Cas wondered why they always didn't spend their trips back like that. It wasn't like there was a money situation or anything. It was a them situation.

Bobby immediately thought Charlie was too perfect for the job. They introduced her to him, and while he seemed to like her, there was something off that Cas pinpointed in miniscule differences in body language than normal.

"Hey," he said in greeting as they piled in the house. "Oh." He saw Charlie and frowned. "Who're you dragging into my house?"

"This is—"

"I'm Charlie Bradbury," she said, introducing herself. "So they tell me you're kind of like the head hunter in this business?"

"Well, no," he said, shaking his head. "Are you a hunter?"

"No, but I think I want to be," she said. She had talked endlessly on the way over about her love for stories about adventures, about her intense longing for one of her own. Luckily she didn't say this to Bobby quite yet, because Cas was pretty sure that Bobby would tear her a new one for considering hunting an exciting adventure, worthy of being written into Tolkien novels and made into several movies.

"You definitely aren't if you're saying you want to be. You don't _want_ to be," he told her gently but firmly, eyes full of wisdom and experience. He stepped back and grabbed a beer, handing it over to her. "But if you set your mind on it, there isn't much I can do to stop you."

She nodded understandingly, taking the beer and not backing down from Bobby's intimidation.

"We'll start teaching you stuff tomorrow," Balthazar said, patting her shoulder. "For now, we should work out sleeping arrangements."

The sound of the door opening and closing had them all looking up toward the entrance, where Gabriel was walking through.

"Hey, Gabe," Cas said, going over to him and hugging him. Gabriel hugged him back and then pulled away. The door didn't open again so Cas was glad to know that Ruby hadn't come with him this time.

"Hey, before all of you get to drinking and talking and then going to bed," Bobby said, "I need a favor of you. My friend, Jody, needs some help. She knows a bit about the supernatural—her family was killed, and I helped her with a werewolf one time—so don't worry about pretending around her. There seems to be some kind of shit going down and she says she needs some hunters."

Bobby explained the case to them, and they got prepared to go to it the next day, although Charlie, Adam, and Dean were going to stay behind.

Gabriel, Balthazar, and Cas all went up to their upstairs rooms and Charlie slept on the couch, which left Adam and Dean drifting around. As soon as Cas had laid down with his pajamas on, Dean knocked on the door and came in.

"Hey," Cas said, smiling at him slightly. He had been looking forward to a decent amount of sleep, but Dean was welcome in his room anytime.

He sat down on the edge of Cas's bed while Cas sat up and waited for Dean to say something. Shadows hooded his eyes, giving him a very eerie look in the darkness. He looked over at Cas, the light coming in from one of the windows in the room illuminating his face, his green eyes.

"I don't know," he said. "I wanted to say something, but I don't know what. Everything's so much more difficult to think about the closer I get to being human."

Cas bit his lip and then moved closer to Dean. "How close are you?"

Dean shrugged slightly and heaved a sigh, shoulders slumping in such a human motion, one he'd never seen any of the angels he knew do. "I can feel my grace fading," he said. "And my wings molting away. And I can feel all these things, these emotions that are more human than angelic, and all these things like less powers. I can't heal and I can't clean things with magic and I can't—there are a lot of things I can't do. I probably have a few weeks or a month left."

Cas nodded, listening closely to Dean. "Well, if you need anything—"

"I know." He hung his head and shrugged again. "I just don't want to fall alone."

He frowned at him. "Alone? You're not alone. We're all here for you and Adam, Dean."

He looked over at him and shook his head. "You're here, but we're both trying so hard to pretend like I didn't rip up your trust and you didn't completely hate me that it's… It's like nothing ever happened. I don't know how to say it because it's different when I think back to things with a more human mind, but… You and your brothers try so hard to pretend like you're invincible that you ruin things. You and your brothers are… You're selfish."

He stared at Dean for a second, frowning more. He had no idea what to say to that. He didn't think he really wanted to even contemplate it, because what if Dean was right? He'd never considered himself selfish before, and no one had really told him he was. But then again, he surrounded himself with people like him, and suddenly here was this guy he cared about that was so much different than him…

"Please don't take that… Well, how can you not take it offensively?" Dean said. He sighed slightly.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, because that was all that came to mind. How did Dean expect him to respond? He probably wasn't thinking like that. He wasn't human, or used to human thoughts.

"No," he said. "No, it's… It's just an observation. I don't know, don't listen to me, Cas."

"No, I want to hear what you say," he said. "I like talking to you."

Dean smiled slightly, looking over at him with unparalleled adoration that made Cas's heart do flips and jumps and made it squeeze happily. And shit, if he didn't have the same look on his face, he didn't know what it looked like, because all he was feeling right then, despite just receiving an insult from Dean, was the same unparalleled adoration. Everything Dean was intrigued him, or made his heart flutter, or made him smile, or gave him this warm, admittedly _selfish_ feeling of "I want that. I want him and I want him to want me."

"Do you know what I think about a lot?" Dean whispered, almost huskily, voice deep and breathy.

Cas paused for a second, realizing that Dean didn't mean to sound as sexual as he did, but damn was it hot when he whispered like that. "Hmm?"

"I think about how I'll miss seeing people's souls," he said. "That's how I can kind of tell things about people. There are certain things that you can read on a soul. The brightness tells you how good they are, and you are… unequivocally good. If you're strong enough, you can read thoughts on the soul, or you can read love and hate. I don't know how else to explain it other than reading it, but the first time I ever laid eyes on your soul in person, I could read the love on there, plain as day. The love that was used up on the people around you. The infinite amount of love leftover for anyone else that entered your life. I could read the passion that you sort of channeled into hate."

Cas was entranced in Dean's low voice, in the way his eyes seemed like their only purpose was to be glued to him, all over him. He subconsciously leaned forward, and when he realized what he was doing, he didn't pull away. He felt the warm radiating from Dean's vessel, from Dean, felt in the air the softness of the words he spoke, the honesty in them.

"If only you could see how pure your soul is," he said, reaching out and just touching Cas on the shoulder, lightly. "If only you could feel it."

He couldn't tell exactly how innocent this was anymore, if Dean just wanted him to know, or if he felt something too. He knew Dean meant it. He could tell that easily, but… he really hoped that he wanted to kiss as much as Cas did.

He held tightly onto that hope as he leaned in the rest of the way and pressed his lips lightly to Dean's, and was overjoyed when he turned out not to be a complete idiot. Dean kissed him back, and his arms snaked around him, and Cas wrapped his around him too and held him as he was being held in return.

They lay down, kissing briefly and sweetly, and Dean pulled Cas close to him, so Cas leaned his head really close and stared into his green eyes until he felt his own droop. His eyes closed and he fell asleep.

When he woke up, Dean was still there, eyes shut like he was asleep too. Cas nudged him slightly to tell him he was awake, but Dean didn't move. He was still breathing, but he wasn't responding. He was sleeping.

That didn't seem like a good sign in terms of his fall, but it wasn't like it was unexpected. He shook him lightly until his eyes opened. The look in them darkened when he realized what happened, how far along he really was, but then they brightened slightly at the sight of Cas.

He hoped his face was as gentle as his heart felt, hoped that it conveyed how much he really did care about Dean's fall. Maybe it didn't seem like it to him before, and maybe that was why he felt alone in his fall, but Cas was really going to make an effort to show that to him without making him think it was because they were seemingly back together.

"I'm going to go downstairs," he said. "Gabriel and Balthazar will want to leave soon."

Dean nodded, sitting up. He didn't seem to have any of the normal I-just-woke-up side effects. Maybe that would come later. Or maybe he was just a morning person.

They went downstairs together and Cas ate a bowl of cereal. Bobby was the only one downstairs, but he was reading a book in the living room, so Cas didn't bother trying to avoid being lovey-dovey in front of him. He knew they wouldn't care—hell, with Bobby, he'd probably predicted they were going to get back together last night—but he knew he wouldn't entirely appreciate it.

There was a sort of ache in his chest every time he kissed Dean, though, because he kept picturing Dean on lazy days at their house in Oregon and Massachusetts. He kept picturing things like the ecstatic kisses they shared the first day they had their children, or the sleepy kisses after long days babysitting Sam and Elle's kids. He pictured the heartbroken kiss he place on Dean's hand at Diana's funeral, pictured the one that he placed on her forehead every time she fell asleep after they sang "Stairway to Heaven" together.

This was his Dean, and he loved him all the same, but he would never know how much it hurt to have his entire world that he felt like he knew for decades die and fade away and be… _fabricated._

Dean seemed to sense—or maybe read on his soul—Cas's unhappiness because he took Cas's hand and squeezed it lightly. Cas looked over at him and he really couldn't get over the look in Dean's eyes. He loved him so unconditionally that it made his heart squeeze as much as his hand.

"I'm gonna go shower and stuff," he told him, kissing him quickly. "I'll be back."

He stood up and went upstairs, filling up his bag with stuff for the hunt and then going to the bathroom, hopping in the shower and then brushing his teeth and whatnot. He changed into clean clothes and went back downstairs, putting his bag by the door so he wouldn't forget it.

Balthazar was downstairs by then, and with him was Adam. He and Dean were talking about the fall while Cas's brother was listening both with interest and sympathy as he ate toast.

"Where's Gabriel?" he asked.

"He and Charlie are outside," Balthazar answered. Cas went over and sat next to Dean, making a point of taking his head above the tabletop, so they didn't have to verbally explain what happened. It was out in the open.

Although Adam and Balthazar both looked, nothing was said about it.

They went out, met Jody Mills, and the four of them—because Sheriff Jody Mills was too badass not to help out—dealt with the case. Gabriel caught sight of another in Kansas, so they went there, dealt with it, and found something interesting.

The Men of Letters bunker.

They explored so much of it but Cas was still sure there was more to see there. They drove back to Bobby's to get all the others. They needed more space.

Bobby was reluctant to leave his house, although the idea of a whole bunker of supernatural books seemed pretty cool to him. Cas couldn't imagine staying there after all the memories the house held, but that seemed to be what tied him there. In the end, they boxed up all of his stuff and he came down to the bunker with him.

The move to the bunker turned out to be their best idea yet. There were a _shit ton_ of bedrooms and a bunch of empty rooms with the prospects of being turned into bedrooms if ever there was the need. Dean and Cas had a room of their own, which almost embarrassed Cas at first, but having a room with Dean was actually the best. Gabriel even said he'd stay for a while.

Things passed in a rush. It felt like nothing was the same anymore, and as soon as Cas caught himself thinking that—several times—he always thought, _The same as what?_ Things were good. He and Dean were happy. They talked and kissed and cuddled and fucked and it was good. It was happy. Cas tried not to avoid talking because Dean got upset when he wouldn't talk to him. Balthazar seemed happy, and he made Adam happy. Even Bobby was pretty content with their life in the bunker, and Charlie was _thrilled_ with the mystic, adventurous feel the bunker gave her. Gabriel, when he came around, was quiet and so not what he used to be, so bent and broken, but he didn't seen necessarily unhappy. Just focused. Aged. Not quite so Gabriel-like anymore, but not unhappy.

Before Cas knew it, two weeks had passed in the bunker and he was left trying to figure out where time went, trying to understand how it took them two days to do the case last week and it still felt like they'd just moved in, how their routine seemed nonexistent to him still because he felt like he hadn't done it enough, although it had been a thing since the second day in the bunker.

Gabriel came back again. He and Cas sat down in the library while everyone else was asleep and talked. Gabriel wouldn't tell him what he'd been doing, but Cas kept talking anyway, grasping for something from the real Gabriel, the old Gabriel, his brother.

"Dean's sleeping all the time now," he said. "He's really weak and he looks really sick but he says as soon as the grace is gone he'll be okay."

Gabriel nodded, looking over at him. "I asked Ruby if she knew how angels fell," he explained quietly. He was always quiet, always passive. "She kinda told me about this before."

"We're going on more cases too," he told him, disregarding any mention of Ruby. His floccinaucinihilipilification of her was so intense, so together with his hatred. She was vile, disgusting, useless. "I mean, we went on one, but with all the stuff with the bunker and Charlie, that's a lot. It feels like a lot."

Maybe it was that he missed Gabe, because he really did, so badly. Maybe it was that he missed his kids, and his grandkids, and his nieces and nephews and great nieces and nephews, and Elle and Sam. Because he _did._ Maybe it was just that he'd lost too much that now that he wasn't on the road, wasn't actively finding distractions, all these things just _hurt._

Because they just did.

It didn't matter. Nothing seemed to. Gabriel got pissed off with him and left before anyone even woke up. Dean stayed in bed all day and Adam stayed with him for the most part, and Cas just sat in the library. He and Charlie worked on hunting training for a little bit, and he searched through some old book for Bobby, but most of the time that day he was just in the library. Balthazar joined him, and they talked idly about Gabriel, but nothing seemed to hold any sort of meaning.

And then Ellen and Jo, for the first time since he went to hell, call them up. They tell them where the bunker is and they come. Jo is amazing as ever, and Charlie absolutely falls in love with her. Ellen and Bobby are like the parents of the bunker almost immediately.

"Ellen," Cas said happily as she came in. Jo came in behind her. "Jo, hey."

The women smiled at him and came over for a hug, which he was happy to give and receive. Balthazar hugged Jo while he hugged Ellen and then they switched, and then the women went off to hug Bobby, Gabriel—who had deemed the occasion worthy enough to have Ruby fly him in—and Balthazar.

"Well, hey, I'm really glad to see you're not in hell, kid," Ellen said, patting him on the shoulder, the look in her eyes nothing but motherly. "Don't you dare sell your soul again or I swear I'll… well, I'll put you through worse hell, somehow."

He smiled at her. "I believe you, Ellen," he said. "No need to tell me, though. Hell kind of was… hell."

And everything rushed through him, suddenly, like hot fire that disintegrated him until nothing was left but a hard that just wouldn't quit and a mind that was reminded of the hellish horrors of the pit. It was the memories, kept at the back of his mind, probably by Dean, that were making him feel so down, so empty.

And now that the memories were allowed back at the front of his mind, he remembered how horrible they were. How fucking _traumatizing_ it was to get all of his limbs ripped apart, to have his heart burned out, to have someone pull his lungs out through his mouth—anything was possible in hell.

Ellen saw the pain on his face, but he smiled, and she let it go while he burned on the inside from long-gone hellfire.

* * *

***Floccinaucinihilipilification is a word that, according to , means "the estimation of something as valueless." Basically I wanted to put in a crazy bullshit word to be weird so floccinaucinihilipilification happened. As used in the sentence I used it in, it's basically saying that if Cas was to estimate the worth of Ruby, he'd estimate her as a worthless piece of crap.**


	27. Chapter 27

_Ellen saw the pain on his face, but he smiled, and she let it go while he burned on the inside from long-gone hellfire._

_…_

Cas felt sick to his stomach the rest of the day and he went back to his room. Dean was asleep, looking pale, dark bags hanging under his eyes. His mouth was slightly open. Cas nudged him lightly and he woke up with a little grunt, squeezing his eyes shut before looking up at him. He smiled slightly. "Oh, hi," he said.

Cas took his hand and laced their fingers as Dean sat up and leaned against Cas. "How are you feeling?"

He leaned his head on Cas's shoulder. "I'm feeling increasingly more human," he told him, voice quiet and sleepy, revealing that Dean had become not so much of a morning person and would likely become even less so when he was fully human.

"So not very good?" he asked.

He shook his head and shut his eyes, curling up against Cas slightly. "Why do you humans ever wake up? Sleeping is so nice."

He grinned over at him and kissed his cheek as Dean lifted his head, waiting legitimately for an answer. "Well, because sleeping is very unproductive."

"Are you kidding me? Who cares? Most things humans do are overwhelmingly unproductive, and you rank sleeping as unproductive above those things?" he said. He shook his head. "Sleeping is _the most_ productive thing."

He grinned over at him. "Well, glad you think so. I just wanted to come check on you. Do you want to get up?"

Dean nodded a little and moved over to the edge of the bed. "I hate lying in bed if I'm not sleeping." He stood up and Cas stood with him to make sure he didn't fall. He was pretty sure he was being overprotective of Dean, but he was worried about him and his transition into human. He seemed to be handling it well but Cas was too pessimistic to completely believe that it was going that well. Things were never as easy as this.

"I get that," Cas agreed, taking his hand so Dean didn't think he was hanging over him like he was. He didn't like it and constantly reminded Cas that he was being overbearing when he was doing it blatantly, so he tended to hide it somehow.

They walked out of the room and through the bunker idly, still exploring things. Dean loved the library and the rooms full of artifacts. While Cas enjoyed those rooms too, the ones with the old technology were really interesting too. They walked to the library and sat down at one of the tables. Cas went and got himself a drink, telling Dean he'd be right back.

The smells and sounds of bacon frying hit him before he made it to the kitchen and he quickened his pace in anticipation, seeing that Balthazar was laughing at Adam as he taught him how to do it. He realized that he should've been teaching Dean human things like cooking too. Balthazar was handling his angel falling better than Cas was.

"Hey, can I have some when you're done?" he asked as he poured himself some lemonade—Charlie insisted that they needed pink lemonade in the bunker. They totally did. Cas completely agreed.

"I'm not making much," Balthazar said. "We're just making some to make sandwiches for me, Jo, and Charlie. They asked for some and Adam asked to learn."

"Oh," he said, nodding. "Well, make some for breakfast tomorrow?"

"Sure," Balthazar said. "Hey, how's Dean doing? Does he want to come learn too? I can show him if you want to go do something else."

It was kind of agreed between the two of them that when the angels got to the point Dean was at, they needed somewhat babysat, and the others didn't exactly see that so he and Balthazar had been trading Dean off at times for the past few days while Dean was getting really weak and tired.

He nodded. "I'll go get him. I want to talk to Jo or Charlie anyway." He liked Charlie and he missed Jo. Hopefully they would be together, as they often were.

He went out to Dean, sipping his lemonade as he went. "Hey, Balthazar's teaching Adam how to cook bacon," he said. "You wanna go learn?"

Dean considered it for a second and then nodded. "Why not." He stood up and slowly walked to the kitchen. Cas walked toward Charlie and Jo's rooms—they both had rooms across from each other toward the edge of one hallway. He knocked on Charlie's door first, and when there was no answer, he went over to Jo's.

She opened the door and smiled at him. "Hey, come in," she said. "I've been wanting to talk to you. I really missed you."

He nodded in agreement as he went into her room, looking around at the bland, dull area. He sat down on the edge of her unmade bed and she came over, trailing her fingers over the bed sheets as she sat. Her brown eyes were alight, full of the smile that didn't quite extend to her lips. Her wavy blonde hair—cut short, obviously having been dyed at one point—was back in a ponytail. She looked so much older than she did the last time that Cas saw her, and he realized that although it was only a year or so ago, that year had aged her a lot.

Everything about her spoke of tales he didn't know yet. Her haircut, her bright eyes, her chipping nails once painted black. Her tank top, well-worn and paint-splattered, hanging loosely over her shoulders. The torn, equally well-worn capris. The falling-apart tan Converse by her door across the room, kicked off precariously.

"Hey, so what did you do since the last time I saw you?" he asked her.

She smiled slightly and looked down. "I hunted a lot," she said.

"Yeah," he said, nodding. "Tell me about it? If that's okay?"

She paused for a second and then nodded. "Okay. Well… Okay. So I really didn't want to hunt alone, but I didn't want my mom to hunt with me, so I found this group of hunters around our age that wanted another member kind of. There was only two of them and they, I don't know, they were getting sick of each other. Figured another member or two would help, would give them better hunting skills and wouldn't drive them so crazy. So I go and meet them somewhere in the middle of nowhere in Nebraska, and Bobby's told me about this group so I basically trust them, but… I don't know, the meeting place was sketchy. I have quite a few knives stashed away in case and I go in, and they're completely cool. So we hunt for a long time."

He told her of all these stories, about how the guy, Carlos, was super good with knives and stuff but was a horrible shot, and the girl, Lilia, was just badass all around. And she totally had a crush on both of them, she said. She told him about how they would laugh all the way around the country as they hunted, and other than the danger and fear on hunts, it was like one long, extended sleepover, partying at clubs and drinking in bars and swimming in shitty motel pools. It was great. She was having the time of her life.

"I felt immortal," she admitted, and her voice, her face, everything about her… It was all too bittersweet. His heart wrenched, only being able to imagine what happened next as she paused, bracing herself for telling the rest of the story. He knew that for hunters, fun never lasted. Love was only temporary before death ripped it away. Nothing was to be guaranteed. And as soon as you get this idea in your head that you're unstoppable, as soon as you think you can protect everybody and their brother—that's when tragedy strikes. You die or your friends do.

"So we called in a friend of ours to help us with this demon," she explained slowly, face slightly red, not from embarrassment but from obviously trying hard to keep her emotions reeled in. "And as it turned out, it wasn't one demon." She glanced over at Cas and gave him the most gut-wrenchingly horrible smile he'd ever seen. It was the kind of smile that tore your heart out with a knife, because that smile only came from the worst kind of pain. It was a smile of deceit, a smile that said, _I'm trying so hard._ "Or two." She paused again. "Or three. It was six fucking demons, all pissed and eager to slice into us. So, uh, our friend, Nyla, she… She was the first to go, so we tried to split. She warned us there were too many, and… and then they got Carlos."

Cas reached over and took her hand comfortingly, hating to see her pain. Strands of her hair that had fallen out of the ponytail hung in her face and she pushed them away in a swift motion.

"So of course, Lilia had to go back for him. Didn't think he was dead. I think they were like siblings or something, like they'd adopted each other, you know? And she just couldn't leave him behind, and I didn't really blame her, but I knew there was nothing we could do. Not two against six. Not four against six, or three against six. Hell, maybe not even fifteen against six, with how powerful these sons of bitches were. So she ran back, and before she could even get in, her neck was snapped, and I… I just darted. I got in the car and I fucking drove a hundred miles an hour until the building was so far behind me that it would've taken me an hour to get back at the speed limit. We were out in the middle of nowhere, and by the time I got back to the city, I was a mess. And… so I went back to the Roadhouse."

Cas squeezed her hand lightly until she finally looked up at him, squeezing his hand back. "What about you?" she asked softly. "Get some of hell off your chest."

"Uh… oh. Listen, Jo, I really… I don't want to talk about hell," he said quietly.

She raised her eyebrows slightly. "Look, Cas, I'd respect that if it weren't for the fact that I know it's killing you inside, and I'm sick of seeing your angsting, and I just told you about one of the worst things that have ever happened to me, and… why can't you tell me?"

"It… I'm just…"

"It scares you?" she said. "Yeah, that scared the shit out of me. Please, Castiel."

He hesitated, but then he thought about why he wouldn't talk to anyone about it, and he couldn't think of a legitimate reason that would appease Jo. So, not very reluctantly, he told her about the most grisly ways in which he was tortured, the worst mind games, the things that made him shiver and shake in his sleep and made him wake up screaming, clutching for Dean and causing the falling angel to wrap him up tight even though he was the one that should've been getting all the comfort with what he was going through. When he was done, Jo looked horrified, but somehow, Cas felt a little better.

…

After his talk with Jo, he continued to talk to her. In the days after that, Ellen and Bobby completely governed the bunker like they were everyone's mom and dad. They acted fatherly and motherly toward literally everyone, patting Balthazar's back, smiling proudly at Charlie when they taught her more things about hunting, asking Dean and Adam how they were feeling. Adam had started to feel weak like Dean had before, and Dean was getting to the point where he needed to eat and sneeze and go to the bathroom. He was all but human except for a bit of grace, and all that grace did was allow him to see souls and make him feel like shit.

"If it means I can still see this soul," Dean whispered to him one night, pointing to Cas's naked chest, "then I hope it never leaves."

Ash showed up at the beginning of the next week, talking of stories from the Roadhouse that he had been watching over while Ellen was gone. They had a buddy that helped them there and Ash said he left the place in his hands.

Cas was talking to Charlie about some hunts he'd been on before—and generally kind of his past, as Charlie had confided to him a very small amount of hers, leaving out what he knew had to be a big, painful chunk—when Ash met her.

He was immediately dumbstruck by her badassery. He had told her that he was the king at all things to do with computer-y stuff, talking in a language that Cas was sure wasn't even English, and he said he could show Charlie a few things. As it turned out, she was some kind of hacking queen.

Cas decided to stay to watch, and while they continued to talk in their technology language, he heard Charlie say, "No, no, not like that."

Ash looked over at her. "What?"

"That could go totally wrong so easily," she admonished, nudging him away from the laptop and typing extremely quickly, apparently fixing Ash's mistake.

He looked over at her after she fixed the mistake and smiled. "I didn't even know that," he said, seemingly impressed. "You downplayed yourself."

She shrugged slightly. "I didn't know how good you were," she said. "But yeah, I'm pretty awesome."

He grinned at her. "I agree with that."

…

Later, he took Charlie out on a case with Balthazar nearby, only forty minutes away from the bunker. The ride there was fun until Cas suddenly realized the resemblance to Jo's car rides with her hunting family before they were killed. He smiled and laughed but didn't contributed, hating the flashbacks to hell, of Balthazar and Gabriel being mutilated by demons, of seeing the people he pictured in his mind as Jo's friends being in Balthazar and Gabriel's places.

Charlie kicked butt against the djinn they went up against, which was no small task as one of her first real cases. Cas sucked and she and Balthazar did most of the work. He was too busy remembering his djinn dream, and after, when they were back in the bunker, Balthazar made him go back to his room and asked him about it.

He nodded when he was asked if he was thinking about it, and Balthazar looked down, trying hard to think of what to say. They were all trying to get better at communicating, all trying to make their relationships healthier and less obsessive. Of course, there was nothing they could do about Gabriel since he was in and out so often, and rarely ever did he stay very long.

He was so distant, so cold and quiet. Calculative. Not Gabriel at all.

"Do you want to talk about the dream? Or about hell?" he asked him quietly.

Cas looked over at him and thought for a second. He didn't want to talk about hell. While unleashing those feelings to Jo felt good afterward, he was doing a good job of overcoming those flashbacks since their talk and he didn't want to break that. He felt like Jo and Dean were the ones he needed to talk to about that, and he didn't want to pull Balthazar into it. And he decided that the dream was better left in the past.

…

Balthazar and Adam went off on a case together. Bobby and Ellen took all the other hunters' phone calls and sent other hunters, including Gabriel if he felt like it, off on cases. Cas stayed back with Dean and talked to Jo a lot, although eventually she went on a case too. Ash and Charlie did computer-y things a lot but she spared time for more hunting talk. And then she insisted they watch television shows together, so they all went to the living room, including Dean, and watched.

Balthazar and Adam soon came back with tales of some badass cop with Jody Mills and this girl who used to live with vampires that Jody Mills had apparently saved and adopted. Cas wasn't really sure what to do with their story.

Adam's face was ashen and he was leaning heavily against Balthazar, whose arm was wrapped protectively around him. There were bags under his eyes, too. The only assumption that Cas could make was that he was getting as far into his fall as Dean was a couple weeks ago.

The very next day, Dean woke up and immediately looked over at Cas with the most heartbroken face in the world. His green eyes were wide and scared and he quickly found Cas's hand to hold onto.

He knew.

"I'm human," Dean whispered, his voice shaky and distant in a way that told Cas he wasn't talking directly to him. Cas squeezed his hand to comfort him because it was all that he could do. Dean slumped forward into Cas's arms but didn't cry or anything. If he cried, Cas would've known what to do. But he just stared at the wall with the same horrible expression for a long time.

"Welcome to the club," Cas said softly after a while, both in an attempt to convey he was there for Dean and that nothing about Dean was changed in his eyes, but Dean didn't make a sound.

…

Gabriel's heart thumped faster than he thought it probably should've. Instead of a steady, thump-thump thump-thump, it was more like a frantic thu-thu-thu-thu-thump.

The demon blood inside him mingled with his own and roared in his ears. He was buzzing with energy and rage, and his face was set like a mask as he held tightly to his knife, which he didn't need. All the power he needed was in his fingertips.

He wondered if this was what demons felt like. This sensation of outright hatred for all things, this blind loyalty to anything resulting in chaos or in favor of him, this uncontrollable urge to be violent and aggressive. He didn't feel small like he usually did—because he _was_ small. He felt large and powerful and furious.

He was a hurricane of power and blood.

Ruby was next to him, her dark hair tucked behind her ears, her knife in her hands. She didn't have the power to survive in the fight that they were preparing for without that knife. Although Gabriel had begun to trust Ruby intimately, he still kept an eye out on her. He wondered if all demons didn't trust anyone like that. He didn't think he could. He hadn't gone back to the bunker in a few weeks because he was sure his mistrust of all of them would be the first thing to give his recent habits away.

"Are you ready? Do you need more?" she asked him quietly. He looked idly around the motel he was in, like it was the last time he was going to see one of these motel rooms. But he wasn't going to die, he was sure of it.

"No," he told her after a moment's consideration. As long as they left soon, he would be okay.

"Are you sure?" She looked slightly concerned, although it was likely not for him, but more for herself and for the sake of the plan's success. He would be worried too if he was leaving it up to her, just because if she messed up there was nothing he could do, but he was confident in himself.

"Yes, I'm sure."

He sat down on the bed and spread his fingers out over the blanket. He remembered living in these motel rooms for most of his younger days, remembered all the motels he, Balthazar, and Cas stayed in. He had so many memories tucked away in motel rooms, but none of them mattered. This would be the most important moment of his life.

"Gabriel," she said, her voice low, almost to where he would call it soft, caring, if he didn't know better. But he knew better.

"Ruby," he replied, not in the mood to play her game. The majority of the time he drank from her, it turned into sex. It was almost too weird when it didn't turn into sex. He felt like a vampire.

She sighed and shook her head, obviously doubting his capabilities, but he didn't bother to get angry with her. She'd see when they got there that he knew when he was ready and when he wasn't.

He stood up, ready to get out of the motel room. He would leave his things there. He knew he would live to go back and get the stuff, so there was no point in putting it in the car. And anyway, even if he did, there was nothing Ruby would do with the stuff. At least the motel people might find some use for a dead guy's stuff somehow.

They went outside and Gabriel got in the driver's seat. He was weirdly alert the whole drive over to the warehouse, and Ruby was silent. He didn't know how this was all set up. He left that part up to Ruby. He stared forward at the road and thought distantly about how she must've planned this entire thing out to a T like she did.

They pulled up to the warehouse and the car was still as quiet as it was when they stepped in. Gabriel got out and waited for Ruby, and they walked forward, a sense of finality to things. Not the death kind of finality, but the finality that comes with the end of an era. They were going to kill Lilith.

Gabriel started feeling a strange sense of déjà vu that he couldn't pinpoint for a second until he realized that right before every big, long awaited case that he and Cas had ever gone on, he had felt this feeling. He felt it when they went to stop Cas from dying and going to hell, except it was also mingled with sadness and pain, too.

A light appeared in front of them, blinding in its intensity. Gabriel threw his arm over his face and ducked his head down, feeling his eyes start to sting as though he'd been looking at the sun for hours. He stumbled backward. Ruby's screams penetrated his ears and he turned, raising one of his hands slightly and using some of his precious power to push her so she wasn't looking at the light anymore.

The light died down slowly and left Gabriel feeling like he had been swallowed up in darkness, stumbling slightly as he tried to find Ruby. He held his arms out to feel for her, and when his eyes finally adjusted slightly, he looked up at the apparent source of the disruption. He expected their target to be there, but instead stood a tall, muscular man, and for a second, other than his longish hair, that was all that Gabriel could make out.

He backed away when he saw who it really was. Sam stood there, staring at him with a look so furious that Gabriel, previously confident and nearly cocky, quivered in fear.

"Gabriel." He could feel Sam's voice down to his very core, shaking him, rocking him, startling him. It was booming and full of archangelic power, such divineness it couldn't be replicated by anyone other than another archangel, and it could only be rivaled by God. "You are about to unleash hell on Earth."

Gabriel stared at him for a second, still afraid but now confused. He knew that he hadn't been the best guy around lately, but he also knew that killing Lilith would be a good thing. He looked past Sam nervously, knowing the demon was back in the warehouse waiting.

"You wouldn't understand," he said, shaking his head, fury strewn delicately across his voice, like cross-stitching. Small little markings of his anger were indicated in such a hardly detectable way, but Gabriel detected it and it was terrifying. He'd felt the wrath of many creatures but the wrath of an archangel was the scariest by far. "_Demons_ don't think." He spit the word out like it offended him to have to say it. Gabriel was all but a demon, wasn't he?

He looked over at Ruby. She was standing rigidly, her head down but her eyes darting from one side to the other. She was frozen in place and tensed up more when Gabriel's eyes settled on her. Sam's eyes moved to her, too, when he saw that Gabriel had been looking, and his gaze hardened even more than it had already been.

He stepped forward and touched Gabriel's forehead, his gaze still locked cautiously on Ruby. He stiffened, thinking for sure he was going to die, but instead he felt all that power, that demonic rush, drain out of him and leave him feeling as small and vulnerable and _human_ as he had before he'd ever met Ruby. He was more terrified than he'd ever been before, all of that blood and protection and confidence wiped away.

Sam turned to Ruby and his face twisted with a look of disgust. "Your face is horrible," he said monotonously. She didn't look up at him. She looked like she was about to fold in on herself and disappear as though she were falling into some black hole. "You will help our side or you will be smote."

She finally glanced up at him, realizing her fate. Gabriel didn't know what he wanted her to do. He was now horrified of all of the things that he'd been willing to do while he was under the influence of the blood. He had been so bloodthirsty, literally. He had torn people apart to satisfy his addiction, and now he still almost wished that the person who had gotten him into it in the first place chose to live. He realized that while the blood was gone, the addiction was still there. There was no demon blood in him and he wanted more.

"I won't go against Lilith," she said with conviction. She was evil but she was loyal. "I've risked my life too many times to care if I die in the process of serving her and our lord."

"Who, Lucifer? He doesn't give a fuck about you," Sam snarled, still as angry as an archangel but speaking like he was human, like he was normal, as he did sometimes around Gabriel.

She stared at him stolidly and hardly moved except for a small flinch when he raised his hand to her forehead. His palm securely against her skin, his fingers splayed out over her hair, he watched her. Gabriel really had no idea what to do but to stand there and watch. He knew Sam would be furious, but he wanted redemption. He wanted Ruby to die. But at the same time, he wanted blood, and he wanted her to live. He was conflicted.

"Do it," she snapped, teeth baring in a vicious grin.

After a moment Sam let his hand drop. He started to speak words Gabriel didn't understand and light came out of Ruby's eyes, nose, mouth, and ears. She screamed, and quickly the light became blinding enough, escalating with her screech. Gabriel turned his head, and when he looked back once the light had faded, Ruby was on the ground, her vessel undamaged. He knew the vessel she was in now was completely empty, though. The girl had already fled the body and died. The body was worthless.

Sam's face was cold, impassive, no longer angry and hard, although he had to still be frustrated with Gabriel.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, hoping Sam would somehow understand. He didn't know how he could, but he wanted someone to. He wanted to be justified to someone. But the truth of it all was that no one would find what he did justifiable in any way.

"I know," Sam replied coolly. "I won't punish you. When your family finds out, they'll be angry enough at you."

They'd hate him. He knew he deserved it, but it still hurt to think that he couldn't keep this a secret forever, and once it was out, the people he loved would think so much differently of him. He was going to be totally alone.


End file.
